What Happened
The Justice Department announced Thursday that a federal jury convicted Sohaib Akhter, 34, of Alexandria, Virginia, on charges including conspiracy to commit computer fraud, password trafficking, and possession of a firearm by a prohibited person.
According to DOJ, Akhter and his twin brother worked for a Washington, D.C. company that provided software products and services to more than 45 federal agencies. Prosecutors said the company hosted government-client data on servers in Ashburn, Virginia, including case-management and Freedom of Information Act response-processing software.
DOJ says the brothers were fired during an online remote meeting on Feb. 18, 2025, after the company discovered Sohaib Akhter's felony conviction. Immediately after that meeting, prosecutors said, the brothers accessed computers without authorization, write-protected databases, deleted databases, and destroyed evidence of the activity. Over several hours, they allegedly deleted about 96 databases storing U.S. government information.
Why This Matters
Federal systems are supposed to be boring in the safest possible way. People file complaints, agencies process records, FOIA requests crawl through the machinery, and everyone hopes the software does not become a workplace revenge piñata.
Instead, DOJ says a firing turned into a database bonfire. That is not just an HR problem with a keyboard. Government systems contain sensitive complaints, requests, and records from people who trusted the machinery not to get rage-deleted by somebody having the worst Zoom exit of the year.
The Dumb Part With The Remote-Meeting Meltdown
The phrase "immediately after being fired during this meeting" is doing a lot of civic horror work here. Most people leave a bad meeting and maybe eat cereal over the sink. DOJ says these guys went for unauthorized access, write-protection, deletion, and evidence destruction like they were speedrunning every red flag in the incident-response handbook.
The extra stupid garnish: DOJ says Sohaib had a prior 2015 federal hacking-related conviction, and the new case also involved a firearm count because prosecutors said he possessed guns despite being a convicted felon. That is not a resume gap. That is a warning label with Wi-Fi.
The Bottom Line
Sohaib Akhter is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 9 and faces a maximum penalty of 21 years in prison. His brother, Muneeb Akhter, is named in DOJ's account as a co-defendant involved in the alleged retaliation.
If losing access to a job makes you think the next step is deleting government databases, the problem is not the termination. The problem is that someone let the human delete key near public systems in the first place.
Sources
Justice Department: Twin Brothers Sentenced in 2015 Wire Fraud and Hacking Case