US Extradites CardPlanet Operator Back to Russia

CardPlanet operator Aleksi Burkov has been deported to his home country of Russia only 14 months after he was sentenced to nine years in prison by a US judge for his role in operating two websites designed to facilitate payment card fraud, computer hacking, and other crimes.

Burkov was arrested in Israel in 2015 and extradited to the US in 2019. In January 2020, he pleaded guilty in US District Court to access device fraud and conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, identity theft, wire and access device fraud, and money laundering. Last summer, he was given a nine-year sentence for operation of CardPlanet, which sold payment card numbers primarily stolen through computer intrusions, victimizing hundreds of thousands of people.

Many of the card numbers offered for sale on CardPlanet belonged to US citizens, the Department of Justice said in a release on Burkov's June 2020 sentencing. The stolen data sold on his website resulted in more than $20 million in fraudulent purchases using US credit card accounts. Another site he ran served as an "invite-only" club where criminals could advertise stolen goods and data.

Burkov was detained by officials with Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs at the Sheremetyevo airport after his deportation from the US. "He is accused of involvement in the manufacture and sale of counterfeit bank cards and trade in the confidential data of clients of financial institutions," said Irina Volk, a representative from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, according to a translation of a RIA article.

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