Alleged Kelihos Botnet Mastermind Extradited to U.S.

Your Feed is from https://www.safeharboroncyber.com/Blog/
CyberWisdom Safe Harbor Commentary on Kelihos Botnet Mastermind:
A recent story from securityweek.com explains a surprising
A 37-year-old Russian is accused of being the Kelihos Botnet Mastermind of the notorious Kelihos botnet that has been extradited from Spain to the United States.
The United States Department of Justice announced that Peter Yuryevich Levatov of St. Petersburg, Russia, also known as Peter Levatov, Peter Severa, Peter Severa and Sergey Aspen Tahov, was convicted Friday in Connecticut. He was unconvinced over the charges against him.
Le Vatov was arrested in April 2017 by the Spanish authorities under a U.S. arrest warrant and has since been held in custody. The suspect was on holiday while apprehended, coinciding with the removal of the Kelihos botnet. About two weeks later, he was indicted in a federal grand jury in Connecticut.
Russia tried to stop him from extraditing to the United States. Levatov said he had previously worked for President Putin’s United Russia party and feared it would be killed if extradited to the United States. Initial media reports said his arrest may be related to the U.S. election, but officials denied the connection.
Eight counts were alleged of causing damage to the protected computers, conspiracy, access to protected computers for fraud, wire fraud, threats to sabotage protected computers, fraudulent e-mail, and increased identity theft. Faced with these allegations, he faced more than 50 years in prison.
According to U.S. authorities, Levashov controls and operates the Kelihos botnet, using it to send spam, gather personal information, and spread other malware. When arrested, investigators said the botnet sometimes contains 100,000 computers, including many in the United States.
Although some security companies tracked Kelihos as Waldac, many listed it as the successor to Waledac, a botnet that was intercepted by authorities in 2010.
Another Russian national to be extradited to the United States is Alexander Vinnik, owner of BTC-e, the cryptocurrency exchange. The Greek Supreme Court recently approved the extradition of Vinnik, who allegedly used bitcoin to clean up $ 4 billion.
After the High Court of the Czech Republic upheld the original mandate to extradite the United States authorities, Yevgeni Nikulin, who violated the LinkedIn, Formspring and Dropbox systems, will soon be extradited.
Read more…
A 37-year-old Russian national accused of being the mastermind behind the notorious Kelihos botnet has been extradited from Spain to the United States. read more Engaging post, Read More…
thumbnail courtesy of securityweek.com
If you like to receive more of these curated safe harbor news alerts then subscribe to my mailing list. and come back soon at https://www.safeharboroncyber.com/Blog/ to read further CyberWisdom Safe Harbor Commentaries. Home » Curated SafeHarboronCyber’s CyberWisdom Post
The post Alleged Kelihos Botnet Mastermind Extradited to U.S. appeared first on Safe Harbor on Cyber.