World news and discussion on TalkFuse.
Astonishing inside story of the £100million heist of the century: How a notorious gang of robbers – dressed as cops and with their pet alsatian Buster in tow – infiltrated a fortress-like data centre to carry out the ‘criminal Mount Everest’…
A convicted armed robber, Terry Ellis, has revealed details of a 2007 heist in which his gang, posing as police officers with a dog named Buster, broke into a fortress-like Verizon data centre in King's Cross, London. The raid, which Ellis called his "criminal Mount Everest", targeted computer chips containing highly sensitive banking data and was commissioned by a criminal "banking syndicate", highlighting how vulnerable even heavily secured data infrastructure could be to determined, well-planned intrusion.
The gang stole Pentium chips worth around £5 million, but the banking data stored on them was reportedly worth some £100 million to those who ordered the theft. Getting into and out of the three-floor, two-acre complex beside Regent's Canal required bypassing eight layers of security, and the operation's audacity later saw it nicknamed the "Ocean's Eleven robbery" after the 2001 heist film. The story has now inspired a novel, Cloudthief by Nathaniel Rich, and is being revisited nearly two decades on as data centres have become central to the global economy and the AI industry.
In short
- Gang posing as police stole banking data worth £100million from a data centre
- 2007 King's Cross Verizon heist bypassed eight levels of security
- Robber Terry Ellis's story has now inspired a new novel, Cloudthief
Explained simply
Data centres store and process information for businesses, including banks. The King's Cross facility at the centre of this story was run by Verizon, and held computer chips containing sensitive banking data.
In 2007, a gang led by convicted armed robber Terry Ellis broke into the heavily secured site while posing as police officers; they brought a dog named Buster. They stole Pentium chips worth about £5 million, though the data on them was reportedly valued far higher by the criminal syndicate that commissioned the raid.
The case drew attention to the security of data centres, which have since become essential to banking and other parts of the economy. Its audacious methods later earned it the nickname “the Ocean’s Eleven robbery” and inspired Nathaniel Rich’s novel Cloudthief.