Estonian National Pleads Guilty to Global Cyber Fraud Scheme Infecting Millions of Computers With Malware
Vladimir Tsastsin, 35, of Estonia, pleaded guilty Wednesday to wire fraud and computer intrusion charges “arising from his operation of a massive and sophisticated Internet fraud scheme that infected” more than four million computers in more than 100 countries with…
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malware, said a news release from the Southern District of New York’s U.S. Attorney’s office. “The malware secretly altered the settings on infected computers, enabling Tsastsin and the six other charged defendants -- Timur Gerassimenko, Dmitri Jegorov, Valeri Aleksejev, Konstantin Poltev, Andrey Taame and Anton Ivanov -- to digitally hijack Internet searches, re-route computers to certain websites and advertisements, and receive payment for the hijacked Internet traffic,” the release said. Tsastsin faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for wire fraud and five years in prison for computer intrusion. Sentencing is Oct. 14.