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Ex-Manchester City IT Worker Tried to Sell Hacked Pep Guardiola Emails for £100,000

Manchester City's cyber security has once again been called into question after evidence emerged that Pep Guardiola's email account was hacked in 2017.  

This comes a year and a half removed from Der Spiegel publishing a series of ​leaked emails regarding the use of subversion tactics to avoid Financial Fair Play regulations. 

Josep Guardiola

As uncovered by an investigation by the ​Sun, Guardiola's account was hacked by a IT contractor who was employed at City for two years from 2016. He described gaining access to the emails as "the easiest thing I’ve ever had to do" to the newspaper's undercover investigators.


The hacker gained access to every player's phone number and also to a number of confidential conversations regarding the club's transfer dealings. He then attempted to sell this information for £100,000, to be paid in Bitcoin.


Among the transfers said to be discussed by Guardiola at this time include deals for former Ajax centre-back Matthijs de Ligt and then-​Borussia Dortmund defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos.


The IT contractor also boasted of having access to all of City's players' contact details. 

Pep Guardiola

"They’re all stored on his (Pep’s) email account — but he doesn’t know, he doesn’t realise,” the hacker told investigators. “You can access the emails from anywhere, if you wanted to. Once you’ve got the password, you’re in.”

The Sun passed their evidence onto the Cityzens, who informed Greater Manchester Police. The man was arrested on Monday. 

A club spokeswoman said on Tuesday: "While we had terminated the services of this consultant and the company he was contracted to two years ago, we were unaware of the serious crimes he is alleged to have committed whilst working with us and the subsequent alleged attempts to profit from those crimes.

Josep Guardiola

“It is a matter of public record that we have been the target of several criminal attacks through our IT systems in recent years.

“Thanks to The Sun in bringing this serious incident to our attention, and Greater Manchester Police for their swift action, at least one alleged perpetrator faces being held accountable for his actions.”

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Source : 90min