An ethical hacker hired as IT advisor at Andheri-Seepz development commissioner’s (DC) office has been arrested for hacking into the SEZ’s server 22 times and stealing data related to policy making after his one-year contract ended last year.

Though Binod Agarwal, (36) a retired Navy personnel, has claimed that he only wanted to pressure the DC to give him back the job, police suspect something more sinister as he had filed 187 RTI applications seeking information related to many Seepz officials and projects.

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“He shared the data with a local news portal and tried to blackmail the DC,” an officer from MIDC police station said, adding that “Early this year, the DC office found that some internal mails and minutes of meetings were published by the portal along with an interview of Agarwal in which he talked about a scam at Seepz.”

When the DC office approached the Centre’s National Informatics Centre (NIC), which hosts the server, to find out how confidential data reached the portal, they learnt about the hacking. Agarwal hacked the server 22 times between September and November last year after his appeals to various authorities to get back his job failed. The DC office lodged an FIR on September 22.

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As the suspect is a retired petty officer, when TOI contacted a senior defence ministry official, he said the Navy cannot comment on the case as Agarwal is not working with the forces now.

“Agarwal’s real intention was to tarnish the image of officials who had opposed some projects that seemed shady. So, the affected people seem to have provoked Agarwal to harass the officials,” the police officer added.

Agarwal, whose resume said he is a BE (Electrical) and ethical hacker, was picked up from his Goregaon flat on Wednesday. Police have seized his mobile phone and laptop. He has been booked under the IT Act for damage to computer, unauthorised access to data and identity theft. He has been remanded in police custody till Friday.