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The man and his co-accused attempted to extort nearly a million rand after installing remote access software on a company computer.
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A 36-year-old man has been sentenced to eight years in prison for cybercrime, fraud, theft of data, and attempted cyber extortion
Lucky Majangandile Erasmus appeared in the Commercial Crimes Court in the Western Cape this week, where the sentence was handed down for the cybercrimes.
He entered into a plea agreement with the state, which resulted in a combined eight years’ imprisonment for his crimes.
Charges
Erasmus faced several charges, including contravening the Cybercrimes Act, theft of data, attempted cyber extortion, unlawful access to a computer system, unlawful interference with a data storage medium, and resetting of passwords, among others.
Erasmus was sentenced after he and his co-accused—both former employees of Ecentric—installed software on the company’s systems to enable remote access, intending to commit cybercrimes.
Thereafter, an unknown person made contact with the CEO of “Ecentric”, indicating that they had compromised various aspects of “Ecentric’s” IT environment and planned to hold Ecentric to ransom.
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Ransom
On 14 November 2023, the individual issued the first ransom demand of US$534,260, to be paid within 16 hours. Failure to comply, he warned, would result in the publication of all compromised data within the next 30 hours across all platforms—including competitors, stakeholders, the public, and regulatory bodies.
Hawks spokesperson, Warrant Officer Zinzi Hani, stated that a second ransom demand was made on 30 November 2023, this time for US$1,000,000. The threat warned that if the payment was not made, further action will be taken to prove the data breach and hack.
“No ransom was paid by Ecentric. Four retail clients of Ecentric suffered a loss of R 794 808.51. The accused have since been in custody from 14th December 2023 till the sentencing of Erasmus whereas his co accused, Felix Unathi Pupu (43) is still in custody to appear on 30 June 2025 for plea and sentencing.
“Erasmus will effectively serve five years direct imprisonment. Additionally, he was declared unfit to possess a firearm,” Hani said.
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