Five hackers indicted for largest known financial data breach in US history

There are your everyday run-of-the-mill hackers, and then there are the hackers who set the bar for everyone else. Though we'd hardly call them exemplary individuals, the five culprits recently indicted for the largest known financial hack in US history would certainly belong in the latter category. Comprised of four Russians and a Ukrainian, the quintet's unsavory accomplishments include breaking into networks belonging to major corporations like Nasdaq, Dow Jones, 7-Eleven and JCPenney -- siphoning more than 160 million credit card numbers and bringing about millions of dollars in losses. They did so with SQL injection attacks to install malware that let them crack passwords and snag other sensitive data. Two of them -- Vladimir Drinkman and Dmitriy Smilianets -- have been arrested, while the rest -- Alexandr Kalinin, Roman Kotov and Mikhail Rytikov -- remain at large. All five could be behind bars for decades if found guilty. For the nitty gritty as to just how and which companies were affected, hit up the source link below. It's enough to make you want to change your password several times over.

Filed under: Internet

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Via: Ars Technica

Source: US Department of Justice