Russian Hacker Convicted of 38 Counts Related To PoS Hack Scheme

A Russian citizen was convicted of 38 counts of wire fraud, identity theft, possession of unauthorized access devices, and other charges in connection with a four-year point-of-sale hacking scheme that cost banks over $169 million in losses and forced one small business into bankruptcy. 

Roman Valerevich Seleznev, aka "Track2," 32, of Vladivostok, Russia, was charged in a 40-count indictment almost two years ago. Last week he was convicted of 10 counts of wire fraud, eight counts of intentional damage to a protected computer, nine counts of obtaining information from a protected computer, nine counts of possession of 15 or more unauthorized access devices, and two counts of aggravated identity theft. His sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 2.

According to the US Department of Justice, between October 2009 and October 2013, Seleznev remotely compromised and installed malware upon many retailers' point-of-sale systems from a server he controlled in Russia. He lifted credit card numbers from the PoS systems, sent them to servers he operated in Russia, Ukraine, and McLean, Va., and then sold them on carding sites. When Seleznev was arrested in July 2014 in the Maldives, his laptop contained more than 1.7 million stolen credit card numbers. 

Many of the retailers that had infected PoS systems were small businesses. One of them was Broadway Grill in Seattle, which was forced into bankruptcy after all the fraud. 

See the DoJ release for more.