A Springfield, Virginia man is under investigation after telling a coworker he hacked into gift card databases to add credit without paying for it.
Muneeb Akhter, 23, claims that he found holes in the software used to load prepaid gift cards and was able to add value illegally, NBC Washington reported. He is president of cyber security firm Warden Systems.
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However, Akhter said in a statement that he did it in the name of research and planned to use the data to counteract gift card theft.
"I'm a researcher," Akhter told NBC. "I've been researching the field for a long time and a lot of my work shows it ... I'm not a malicious guy."
Among the brands Akhter supposedly used for his research are Kmart, Starbucks, Dunkin' Donuts and Sears. However, he denies actually spending the combined total of at least $1,395 that he loaded on the gift cards.
Akhter is best known for graduating college at 19 years old -- along with his twin brother, Sohaib -- with an electrical engineering degree from George Mason University in 2011.