A hacker from Vladivostok, Russia, installed malware in retail point-of-sale systems that allowed him to steal more than 1.7 million credit card numbers between October 2009 and October 2013, according to the Department of Justice.
Bundling that information on servers controlled in Russia, Ukraine or McLean, Virginia, Roman Valerevich Seleznev sold it to buyers whose fraudulent purchases cost 3,700 financial institutions more than $169 million before a U.S. Secret Service Electronic Crimes Task Force investigation led to his capture in July 2014.
An eight-day federal jury trial of Seleznev, who goes by the handle Track2 online, resulted in a conviction of multiple counts of wire fraud, intentional damage to a protected computer, obtaining information from a protected computer, possession of unauthorized access devices and aggravated identity theft.
Confirmed by evidence found on Seleznev’s laptop, some of the business systems breached were in western Washington state, leading to the involvement of detectives from the Seattle Police Department and the U.S. Secret Service Cyber Intelligence Section in Washington, D.C., as well as the Justice Department’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, the Office of International Affairs, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the District of Guam.
Seleznev also faces separate indictments in Nevada for participation in a racketeer-influenced corrupt organization and in the state of Georgia for wire fraud.
