Ferrari Dealership Sues Rival for Corporate Espionage

We've heard about espionage cases between two companies or two F1 constructors, but this is a bit too much to digest. A Long Island, New York, dealership that sells Bentleys and Aston Martins is being sued by a rival one that specializes in Ferraris and Maseratis for corporate espionage.

According to Bloomberg, the owners of Universal Autosports LLC in Glen Cove, Giacomo Ciaccia and Leka Vuksanaj, were arrested two days ago along with Creative Director Michael Lussos. Their crime? Tapping into the e-mail of Ferrari Maserati of Fort Lauderdale-Long Island in Plainview, New York.

We imagined spying as being more of a one-off thing, but these guys had a different agenda. Apparently, the two defendants gained access to the plaintiffs' e-mail server no less than 2,500 times from February to September 2008.

The question that arises is what kind of information a dealership would hope to get from a rival? Well, when that rival is about to sell a $1.3 million Ferrari Enzo to a customer you can see why the owners felt the urge to become hackers.

“In one instance a dealer associated with Universal Autosports e-mailed a customer who had been negotiating with Ferrari Maserati to buy a rare Ferrari Enzo worth more than $1.3 million,” a statement from the Acting U.S. Attorney Lev Dassin in Manhattan quoted by the aforementioned source read.

And what do you do with the information? Simple. You try to get between the rival and the customer so that you can sell your own cars, in this case, a Bentley or an Aston Martin.

“Is there any way I can help or get in the middle. Have they found you a car yet?” the defendants reportedly wrote in an e-mail to the client.

Giacomo Ciaccia, Leka Vuksanaj and Michael Lussos are charged with one count each of “conspiracy to access a computer without authorization and obtain information for commercial gain and to further an intended fraud,” Bloomberg wrote and they face a sentence of five years in jail, plus a $250,000 fine. If they're found guilty that is.