A Russian Cybercriminal could be Extradited to either US or Russia

Softpedia.com reported on 18th April, 2014 stating that Russia and United States are requesting extradition of Vladimir Drinkman, a Russian national, accused of being the head of a big gang of cybercrimiinals and accordingly he could be extradited to one of the countries.

Drinkman was arrested in the Netherlands during June 2012 and both United States and Russia have requested for his extradition.

Rotterdam court (in Netherlands) recently ruled that both requests were admissible but final decision lies with the Dutch Ministry of Justice who will take final decision about the country to which Drinkman will be extradited.

It is clear why the government of the United States wants Drinkman as he was suspected to be involved in one of the largest data thefts in history in the US during July 2013 along with four others but on the other hand, it is not clear why Russia wants Drinkman.

According to accusation of the court, Drinkman is said to be a "sophisticated hacker with expertise in penetrating and gaining entry to the computer networks of MNCs (multinational corporations), financial organizations and payment processors."

The investigators found that Drinkman along with three other Russians and one Ukrainian exploited SQL injection vulnerabilities and planted a piece of malware to steal sensitive information. The stolen information of payment card was sold to other individuals who distributed it through underground forums or directly to other fraudsters and organizations.

Investigating officials estimated that attacks on the payment systems caused more than 950,000 theft of cards and loss of hundreds of million dollars.

Drinkman was apprehended in the Netherlands on the same day when another Muscovite, Dmitriy Smilianets, who was after a few weeks extradited to the US, entered a not culpable plea on 12th August, 2013 and has been jailed in US ever since then. However, court records demonstrate that he has conferred a culpability plea to the prosecutors.

Prosecutors said that Smilianets traded personal identification information like usernames and passwords, ways of identification, debit and credit card numbers and personal identification details of cardholders. US said that this information is known as "dumps" and he sold these to resellers.

» SPAMfighter News - 4/30/2014