Russian hackers accused of using Bitcoin for the purchase of criminal infrastructure

The Department of State of the United States has been conducting an investigation in which 12 Russian intelligence officers are accused of having been linked to piracy offenses in the 2016 US presidential ballot.

On July 13 of this year, Deputy Prosecutor General Rod Rosenstein declared that "in an effort to hide their connections with Russia, the defendants used a computer network located around the world, and paid for it with cryptocurrencies" .

This network of computers is so large that it was even discovered that there were units located in US territory once the investigation progressed.

A key point to note

In order to simplify the acquisition of the tools used (personal and government computers, stolen documents, etc.) in the activities linked to the rigging of the ballots, the defendants conspired to launder an approximate USD 95,000 in a cryptocurrency network.

To be more specific, the document says:

"To facilitate the purchase of the infrastructure used in its piracy activity - including hacking into the computers of US persons and entities involved in the 2016 presidential election and the release of the stolen documents - the Defendants conspired to launder the equivalent of more than USD 95,000 through a network of structured transactions to capitalize on the perceived anonymity of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. "

The list of defendants has names of officials of Unit 26165 and Unit 74455 of the Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Russian government, such as:

Viktor Borisovich Netyksho
Boris Alekseyevich Antonov
Dmitriy Sergeyevich Badin
Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov
Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev
Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev
Nikolay Yuryevich Kozachek
Pavel Vyacheslavovich Yershov,
Artem Andreyevich Malyshev
Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk
Aleksey Aleksandrovich Potemkin
Anatoliy Sergeyevich Kovalev

For now, there are 11 criminal charges described in the indictment against the aforementioned individuals, and Vice Prosecutor Rosenstein contends that:

"Count ten accuses the eleven money laundering conspirators by transferring cryptocurrencies through a network of transactions to buy servers, register domains and make other payments in advance of their hacking activities, while trying to hide their identities and his links with the Russian government. "

For now, the story is still ongoing and CryptoTendencia will be working to do the corresponding follow-up. The struggle of the authorities against those who use cryptocurrencies for illicit activities is one of the biggest obstacles to overcome so that confidence in the ecosystem continues to grow.

If confidence grows, cryptocurrencies prevail.

Source: ETHNews