US indicts Russian spies for Yahoo hack
THE US has charged two Russian spies and two criminal hackers for attacking 500 million Yahoo accounts in 2014.
THE US Justice Department has indicted two agents of Russia’s FSB spy agency and two “criminal hackers” over a massive cyberattack affecting 500 million Yahoo users in 2014.
The indictment unveiled in Washington on Wednesday links Russia’s top spy agency to one of the largest hacking attacks in history, which officials said was used for espionage and financial gain.
Officials identified the agents as Dmitry Dokuchaev and Igor Sushchin, both of whom were part of the successor agency to Russia’s KGB.
"There are no free passes for foreign state criminal behaviour": US acting assistant attorney general on @Yahoo hack https://t.co/CpRtXk6cJ0 pic.twitter.com/XmRjeIBqCl
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) March 15, 2017
Dokuchaev was an officer in the FSB Centre for Information Security, known as “Centre 18,” which is supposed to investigate hacking and is the FBI’s point of contact in Moscow for cyber crimes.
The 33-year-old was reported to have been arrested in Moscow earlier this year on treason charges. He is accused of directing the Yahoo hack along with his superior, the 43-year-old Sushchin.
Acting AAG McCord's Remarks on Charges Against Russian FSB Officers & Their Criminal Conspirators for Hacking Yahoo https://t.co/zOCRtKBSRQ pic.twitter.com/N99cRshuJK
— Justice Department (@TheJusticeDept) March 15, 2017
The two officers “protected, directed, facilitated and paid criminal hackers to collect information through computer intrusions in the United States and elsewhere,” acting assistant attorney general Mary McCord told reporters.
They hired Alexsey Belan and Karim Baratov, described as “criminal hackers”, to carry out the attacks.
Ms McCord said the attack was directed at gathering information “clearly some of which has intelligence value,” but adding that “the criminal hackers used this to line their own pockets for private financial gain.”
Targets included Russian and US government officials, including cyber security, diplomatic and military personnel, Ms McCord said.
“They also targeted Russian journalists; numerous employees of other providers whose networks the conspirators sought to exploit; and employees of financial services and other commercial entities,” she added.
Ms McCord said Baratov, a Canadian national, was arrested this week on a US warrant in Canada.
Belan, 29, has been indicted twice in US cases involving the hacking of e-commerce companies, and is listed as one of the FBI’s “Cyber Most Wanted criminals.”
The attack on Yahoo, disclosed last year, was one of the largest ever data breaches ever and at the time was blamed on a “nation-state” attacker.
The indictments come amid a high-stakes US investigation into claims of Russian cyber-meddling in the US election, potentially to aid the winning efforts of Donald Trump.
Asked if there were any links between the two cases, Ms McCord said, “We don’t have anything that suggests ... any relationship between those” cases. The other case “is an ongoing investigation,” she added.
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