Manager embezzles Dhs7.5m from workplace

Ehab Atta, Staff Reporter

The Dubai Criminal Court has convicted a manager of a company in a case of embezzling Dhs7.5 million from his workplace with which he bought a villa for himself.

The court sentenced the convict to three years in jail to be followed by deportation. He was also slapped with a fine of Dhs7.9 million.

The case dates back to the time when the convict exploited his position to embezzle about Dhs7.5 million over four years.

During that period he bought a villa under his name, in addition to Dhs270,000 as an education allowance for his children. Moreover, he used the company’s cars for his personal needs.

He confessed to the charges during an internal investigation of the company. He admitted that he had already purchased the villa with the company’s funds but it was based on an oral agreement and the approval of the chairman of the company.

Meanwhile, the latter denied that approval and had no knowledge of the purchase of the villa.

In another case, the Public Prosecution has referred a 43-year-old Arab national charged with hacking a website of a government department.

He reportedly stole data of several business licences.

During the investigation conducted by the Dubai Public Prosecution, a 36-year-old director testified that when he was on duty received an alert from the IT department about an unknown person who had hacked into the department’s website.

Immediately, the Dubai Cybersecurity Centre was alerted about the incident. The nessarsy prosedures were taken and the hacker was located and seized.

The hacking process was carried out through a link to the department’s electronic services via the accused’s mobile number, which led to identifying him.

The accused reportedly copied data of commercial licences, and displayed a large number of them on the site, although they are highly confidential and not accessible to anyone unless authorised to do so.