Three Russian nationals have been indicted in what investigators said was a conspiracy that cost entities more than $62 million across 21 states. A $10 million reward has been offered for information leading to their arrest.
The investigation leading up to the indictment began seven years ago in Cleveland, said U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio David Toepfer.
“Because of the investigative team’s tireless efforts, the cyberinfrastructure supporting American hospitals, schools, civic organizations and companies are safer, more secure and strengthened against attacks by malicious cybercriminals,” Toepfer said.
The three Russian nationals – Alexander Alexandrovich Volosovik, 43, Kirill Andreevich Zatolokin, 34, and Yulia Vladimirovna Pankova, 29 – and companies connected to them – Media Land LLC and ML Cloud LLC – are based in St. Petersburg and accused of offering secure web hosting services for use in ransomware attacks.
Toepfer did not name any organizations that were targeted by the ransomware attack.
The three Russians were charged in a 75-page indictment in 2024, which was recently unsealed.
The three Russians are accused of offering secure web hosting services to cybercriminals who used them to launch ransomware attacks.
Toepfer said many of those attacks occurred in Northeast Ohio.
“In fact, Media Land controlled vast numbers of servers which controlled thousands of IP addresses that hosted some of the most vicious ransomware gangs on the planet,” Toepfer said.
Victims were located in Akron, Brookfield, Canton, Cleveland, Elyria, Medina, Findlay, Solon, and Valley View, according to a release.
“They also offered a service known as bulletproof hosting,” Toepfer said. “The cyber criminals used bulletproof hosting to evade security software so they could infect computer systems of organizations and then hold them for ransom.”
“Bulletproof hosting” is a practice that goes back years, allowing child pornographers, spammers and identity thieves, among others, to operate on the web beyond the reach of law enforcement.
The investigation that led to this 75-page indictment, which was filed under the Biden administration and only recently unsealed, started with a hacking-related crime reported to the Cleveland office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Toepfer said.
“As the FBI is so good at doing, they started peeling back layers of the onion and realized that this was far larger than your typical hacker, just trying to break into somebody’s computer system,” he said.
According to the indictment, 17 separate, unnamed groups committed cybercrimes with the assistance of the co-defendants and their companies.
It was unclear whether any arrests or other actions have occurred in the case because it remains under seal in federal court.
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