Fannie Mae Corporate Intruder Sentenced to Over Three Years in Prison for Attempting to Wipe Out Fannie Mae Financial Data
Malicious Code Would Have Destroyed Mortgage Information

BALTIMORE, MD—U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz sentenced computer programmer Rajendrasinh Babubhai Makwana, age 36, of Montgomery County, Maryland, today to 41 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for computer intrusion arising from the transmission of malicious script to Fannie Mae’s computer servers. A federal jury convicted Makwana on October 4, 2010.

The sentence was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein and Special Agent in Charge Richard A. McFeely of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“Computer intrusion cases are a high priority for federal law enforcement because of the potential to cause serious damage,” said U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein. “Mr. Makwana was trusted with access to the computer system, and he violated that trust.”

Makwana was a contractor working at Fannie Mae’s Urbana, Maryland facility from 2006 to October 24, 2008. Makwana was a UNIX engineer who worked on Fannie Mae’s network of almost 5,000 computer servers.

According to testimony and evidence presented at trial, Makwana was fired on October 24, 2008 and told to turn in all of his Fannie Mae equipment, including his laptop. On October 29, 2008, a Fannie Mae senior engineer discovered a malicious script embedded in a routine program. A subsequent analysis of the script, computer logs, Makwana’s laptop, and other evidence revealed that Makwana had transmitted the malicious code on October 24, 2008, which was intended to execute on January 31, 2009. The malicious code was designed to propagate throughout the Fannie Mae network of computers and destroy all data, including financial, securities, and mortgage information.

United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein thanked the Federal Bureau of Investigation for its investigative work and commended Assistant United States Attorney P. Michael Cunningham and Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Anthony V. Teelucksingh assigned from the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, who prosecuted the case.