Tariq Malik, Pranknet's founder and leader, is pictured in a webcam still taken in his Windsor, Ontario bedroom.
Posted on 08/04/2009 11:59:26 PM PDT by Keltik
A TSG investigation unmasks the leader of Pranknet and the miscreants behind a year-long wave of phone call criminality
AUGUST 4--At 4:15 AM on a recent Tuesday, on a quiet, darkened street in Windsor, Ontario, a man was wrapping up another long day tormenting and terrorizing strangers on the telephone. Working from a sparsely furnished two-bedroom apartment in a ramshackle building a block from the Detroit River, the man, nicknamed "Dex", heads a network of so-called pranksters who have spent more than a year engaged in an orgy of criminal activity--vandalism, threats, harassment, impersonation, hacking, and other assorted felonies and misdemeanors--targeting U.S. businesses and residents.
Coalescing in an online chat room, members of the group, known as Pranknet, use the telephone to carry out cruel and outrageous hoaxes, which they broadcast live around-the-clock on the Internet. Masquerading as hotel employees, emergency service workers, and representatives of fire alarm companies, "Dex" and his cohorts have successfully prodded unwitting victims to destroy hotel rooms and lobbies, set off sprinkler systems, activate fire alarms, and damage assorted fast food restaurants.
But while Pranknet's hoaxes have caused millions of dollars in damages, it is the group's efforts to degrade and frighten targets that makes it even more odious. For example, a bizarre July 20 prank ended with a hotel worker actually sipping from a urine sample provided by a guest at a Homewood Suites in Kentucky. Additionally, at least twice this year, fast food workers--fearing that they would suffer burns after being doused by chemicals from a fire suppression system--stripped off their clothes on the sidewalk outside their respective restaurants.
(Excerpt) Read more at thesmokinggun.com ...
Tariq Malik, Pranknet's founder and leader, is pictured in a webcam still taken in his Windsor, Ontario bedroom.
I hope they nail his a$$ to the wall.
Bookmarking, great story, thanks for posting.
For archive.
Thank you Jet Jaguar.
I do appreciate it.
ping
Sounds to me more like terrorism rather than pranks. Albeit on a low level - but still. Of course if his name were Ole Olafson I would have gone with the prank thingy.
ON THE INTERNET:
twitter.com/pranknet
#
www.youtube.com/user/pranknet
“This account is suspended.”
Pwnt
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,532241,00.html
“Online Pranksters Wreak Havoc at Hotels, Restaurants Nationwide”
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
By Joseph Abrams
PrintShareThis
Conway Police Department
SNIPPET: “”I’m amazed that nobody has hurt themselves yet by breaking these giant plate glass windows [at hotels]. I’m amazed that he’s still making all of these calls when he knows the FBI is investigating them and he’s probably caused millions in damages at this point.”
The FBI’s field office in Knoxville, Tenn., is looking into possible revelations of Dex’s identity following an incident that caused an estimated $50,000 of damage at a Holiday Inn Express in Conway, Ark. An employee there was convinced to set off the fire alarm, shatter front windows and bash off a sprinkler head, which set off the sprinkler system and flooded the hotel.
A Knoxville woman named Jericho Batsford contacted the FBI’s field office in Knoxville and said she knew Dex’s identity and confirming that he was responsible for the Conway call and many others, according to the Log Cabin Democrat of Arkansas.”
Well, if TSG knows who he is and who his confederates are, why doesn’t the FBI lock his butt up?
Soon, soon...
Some of the pranks were funny but these guys need to nailed for all the destruction they caused. They will be extradited and prosecuted
I vote for the latter.
Reminds me of this:
There is some NSFW stuff at this link
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Louise_Ogborn
That’s a really important piece of investigative journalism that will probably become a source for the FBI’s investigative efforts. And it didn’t appear in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe or the L.A. Times. No, it appeared on The Smoking Gun.
That tells you everything you need to know about the state of the main stream media.
That they aren’t actually interested in Journalism? Shocker.
I’ll say this. Being a Conservative and knowing how the State Run Media operates, it was instructive to watch Mixed Martial Arts start being covered by the State Run Types. Before it had mainly been covered by niche fans, and people that loved the sport and tried to tell the stories as they unfolded (Bloggers etx). For years those guys said just wait till the Main Stream guys come, and you evil promoter types won’t be able to get away with your lies. Well, The MSMs showed up, and started regurgitating press releases. Seriously word for word. The people that had covered the sport for years were shocked! (And these guys were all lefties, as is almost anyone in Sports journalism). I was like DUH. These people aren’t going to bite the hand that feeds them. They want Access. They don’t know the fighters. They don’t know the managers. They want this to be easy. Oh this fits the template Sweet! Copypasta!
I’d even volunteer to mop up afterwards.
My pleasure.
Charming. Sometimes I think we should let the human race die off and give the rats a chance.
We already elected their Leader; it is turning out to be even worse.
It's time to call the exterminators.
That article is serious and deserving punishment.
And how could TSG track this creep down but not the FBI?
bump.
... OMG!!! break the mirror!
Gotta commend TSG for their tenacity and boldness in chasing down this scum where it lives.
[mark for later perusal]
On July 21, a pair of TSG reporters approached "Dex"'s building at 1637 Assumption Street in Windsor, where he lives in the ground-floor 'B' apartment. Calling to his mother, who was standing near an open living room window, a reporter asked her to summon her son. The woman disappeared into "Dex"'s adjoining bedroom, where the pair could be heard whispering. Despite repeated requests to come out and speak with TSG, "Dex" hid with his mother in his bedroom, the windows of which were covered with plastic shopping bags, a towel, and one black trash bag.
As the sun set and his room darkened, "Dex" did not reach to turn on a light. The notorious Internet Tough Guy, who has gleefully used the telephone to cause all kinds of havoc, was now himself panicking. He had been found. And, as a result, was barricaded in Pranknet World Headquarters with his mom, while two reporters loitered outside his window and curious neighbors wondered what was up.
That's when the online outlaw came up with a plan.
Tariq Malik, the 25-year-old founder and leader of Pranknet, decided to call the police.
Tariq Malik, Pranknet's founder and leaderThe whole group should be strung up with piano wire and the carcasses left for excarnation by the buzzards. Thanks martin.
Go TSG!
Note to the liberal MSM: This is what an investigative journalism piece is supposed to look like.
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