Cybercrime charges included in latest Trump indictment

Former US President Donald Trump and his associates could face criminal hacking charges as part of Trump's latest criminal indictment.

An Atlanta, Georgia grand jury issued an indictment on 40 different criminal counts against a group of 19 people including the former President for their actions in the aftermath of the 2020 US Presidential election.

The case stems from Trump's efforts to have Georgia's hotly-contested election results either overturned or modified as part of a larger campaign to have close-running states flipped to his side from that of eventual winner and US President Joe Biden.

Trump has long contended that the voting results were fraudulently modified and that the 2020 election was "stolen," a campaign which culminated in the deadly January 6 riot at the US capitol.

This case is being handled in the Georgia state court, as opposed to a wider-ranging investigation by special counsel Jack Smith at the federal court level.

Among the counts listed in the indictment are three cybercrime charges: conspiracy to commit computer theft, conspiracy to commit computer trespass, and conspiracy to commit computer invasion of privacy.

On the first count of conspiracy to commit computer theft, the grand jury found reason to believe that Trump attorney and advocate Sidney Powell along with associates Cathleen Laham, Scott Hall, and Misty Hampton sought to break into systems owned by voting hardware company Domain Voting Systems in order to access voting results.

It is alleged that the group "unlawfully conspired to use a computer with knowledge that such use was without authority and with the intention of taking and appropriating information, data, and software."

Additionally, Powell alone was accused of hiring a third-party investigator to break into Domain voting machines. Powell was said to have delivered the payment to employees of forensics company SullivanStrickler with the intent of access voting machine data.

Finally, the indictment alleges that Laham, Hall, and Hampton also aided in the effort by aiding and encouraging SullivanStrickler to investigate a local voting precinct with what the grand jury termed was an  "intention of taking and appropriating information, data, and software, the property of Dominion Voting Systems Corporation, while inside the Coffee County Elections and Registration Office in Coffee County, Georgia, which were overt acts to effect the object of the conspiracy, contrary to the laws of said State, the good order, peace and dignity there of."

So far, none of those named in the indictment have entered a plea.