FIA registers case against threatening email sent to New Zealand after pull out

• Data reveals email account created in Singapore.
• Email sent from device in India, reveals data.
• Subject of the email was: "Terror attack coming".

The Federal Investigation Agency's (FIA) cyber-crime wing has registered a case against an email address that had threatened the New Zealand team after the Kiwis had pulled out of their tour to Pakistan.

"The email was sent to New Zealand Police with the ulterior motives to coerce, intimidate, and create fear, panic, insecurity in the government, public, and create threat to international peace," the FIR mentioned.

The FIR mentioned that information from Interpol Wallington through Interpol National Central Bureau (NCB) revealed that the email account — hamzaafridi7899gmail.com — had sent a threatening email to informationpolice.govt.nz.

The subject of the email was: "Terror attack coming".

“Dear New Zealand cricket you did wrong to Pakistan and now see what happens to you. Your cricket team is not going anywhere now in every places the bomb will be placed from your hotel to your flight And my mens will not forgive you they're coming New Zealand #PakistanZindabad," the email's text read.

Interpol, with the help of details provided by Google, indicated that the IP used to create the email account was from Singapore, while the IP of the device, through which the email was sent, is connected in India.

The FIR stated that U/S 10 (Cyber Terrorism) — coerce, intimidate, create a sense of fear, panic or insecurity in the government or the public or a section of the public or community or sect, or create a sense of fear or insecurity in society — Section 506 — whoever commits the offence of criminal intimidation shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both — and Section 109 — whoever abets any offence shall, if the act abetted is committed in consequence of the abetment, and no express provision is made by this code for the punishment of such abetment, be punished with the punishment provided for the offence.

'Threatening email sent to NZ cricket team from Mumbai'

In a similar development, Federal Minister for Information Fawad Chaudhry held an important press conference on New Zealand's withdrawal from the recent ODI series in Pakistan, revealing that a threatening email was sent to the Black Caps from India.

Flanked by Interior Minister Sheikh Rasheed, the information minister said the email, after the tour was cancelled on September 17, was sent to the New Zealand team on September 17 at 11:25pm PST, from an ID generated under the name Hamza Afridi.

He said that Interpol Wellington intimated Interpol Pakistan about the threat on September 18. The minister read out the email's transcript:

"Dear New Zealand Cricket, you did wrong to go to Pakistan and now see what will happen to you. Your cricket team is not going anywhere now. In every place, the bombs will be placed now, from the hotel to your flight. My men will not forgive you, they are coming to New Zealand. Pakistan Zindabad, Allah hu Akbar."

"This email was sent from a device based in India," he said. "The IP address of the email generated was changed using a VPN to show Singapore as the location," revealed the information minister.

"The device which was used to send the email, further investigation revealed, was operating 13 email IDs," said Chaudhry. "All IDs were generated on the names of Indian actors and drama celebrities," he added.

Chaudhry said that the device used to send the threatening email to the New Zealand squad belonged to an Indian man named Om Prakash Mishra from Maharashtra.

"This is a very strong link to India," he said. "A fake ID of hamzaafridi7899gmail.com was used to send a threat to New Zealand team. This threat was sent from Maharashtra," he added.