WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Justice Department indicted eight Russian and Eastern European computer hackers, alleging they were part of a crime ring that allegedly broke into ATMs in hundreds of cities world-wide and stole $9 million in a matter of hours.
Case Documents Criminal indictment of the eight hackers Prosecutors in Atlanta announced indictments Tuesday in a scheme that is among the most brazen and damaging electronic-bank heists disclosed to date. One of the men accused was arrested and is awaiting extradition from Estonia. The others are thought to be at large.
The alleged hackers cracked a computer system at RBS WorldPay Inc, the US payment processing division of Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC, and cloned prepaid ATM cards, which thieves then used to withdraw cash from 2,100 ATMs from 280 cities around the world, including in the U.S. The synchronized operation, which began Nov. 8, 2008, took no more than 12 hours.
The RBS case is part of a boom in online theft from financial institutions. "More money is stolen electronically or [in] data breaches than through bank robberies," Shawn Henry, assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Cyber Division, said in an interview.
The alleged hackers targeted payroll debit cards that companies issue employees for withdrawing their salaries. Once the hackers entered the systems, they boosted the maximum allowed withdrawal and then tried to destroy data on the systems to cover up the break-in, prosecutors alleged. (Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Gangsters from the former Soviet Union have established a strong and abiding presence in the New York/New Jersey/Pennsylvania region, engaging in a wide array of crimes that range from sophisticated financial frauds to narcotics trafficking to murder.
Evidence also shows that members of disparate Russian-emigre crime groups here have the potential to develop into one of the most formidable organized crime challenges to law enforcement since the advent of La Cosa Nostra.
These are among the key findings of the Tri-State JointSoviet-Emigre Organized Crime Project, a cooperative research andinvestigative effort launched four years ago by four agencies in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania - the New York Organized Crime Task Force, the New York State Commission of Investigation,the New Jersey State Commission of Investigation and the Pennsylvania Crime Commission.
Investigative agents and staff from these agencies conducted the project in conjunction with criminal justice experts from Rutgers University. The Project's report presents the first comprehensive publicassessment of the threat posed to this region by criminal elements emanating from within the former Soviet Union.
The report catalogues the history and growth of Russian-emigre crime networks, from their core base in the Brighton Beachsection of Brooklyn to their current reach well beyond the New York metropolitan area into the counties of central New Jersey and the suburbs of Philadelphia.
One of the most troubling aspects is evidence of links between individuals here and criminal elements in the former Soviet Union, a phenomenon that lends a disturbing and complex international dimension to this emerging domestic law enforcement problem.The range of criminal and illicit activities linked to these groups is impressive.
The Project report details Russian-emigre involvement in a variety of highly sophisticated frauds and confidence schemes, financial crimes, including money laundering, counterfeiting and securities fraud, narcotics trafficking and an assortment of vice crimes.Russian-emigre criminals are no strangers to violence either.
THE NATURE OF RUSSIAN-EMIGRE CRIME
Crimes of Deception
Motor Fuel Tax Fraud
Insurance and Entitlement Fraud
Confidence Schemes
Counterfeiting
Violent Crimes
Homicide/Attempted Homicide
Extortion and Kidnapping
Drug Trafficking
Money Laundering
Vice Crimes (Regpay, a Florida credit card processing company operated by Byelorussians, was nailed for processing online child porn payments; Minx, Belarus, once a constituent republic of the Soviet Union (independent since 1991) is the country of origin of many of these predators now thieving on US soil.
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SOURCE http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:Ahm0dOHcKHEJ:www.state.nj.us/sci/pdf/russian.pdf
Amazing.