COURT DOC: Russian National Charged with Decade-Long Series of Hacking and Bank Fraud Offenses and Second Russian National Charged with Involvement in Deployment of “Bugat” Malware

The United States of America, through its Departments of Justice and State, and the United Kingdom, through its National Crime Agency (NCA), today announced the unsealing of criminal charges in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Lincoln, Nebraska, against Maksim V. Yakubets, aka online moniker, aqua, 32, of Moscow, Russia, related to two separate international computer hacking and bank fraud schemes spanning from May 2009 to the present. A second individual, Igor Turashev, 38, from Yoshkar-Ola, Russia, was also indicted in Pittsburgh for his role related to the Bugat malware conspiracy.

For over a decade, Maksim Yakubets and Igor Turashev led one of the most sophisticated transnational cybercrime syndicates in the world…Deploying Bugat malware, also known as Cridex and Dridex, these cybercriminals targeted individuals and companies in western Pennsylvania and across the globe in one of the most widespread malware campaigns we have ever encountered. The Zeus scheme was one of the most outrageous cybercrimes in history. (Source: U.S. Department of Justice)