Suspected Russian cybercriminal arrested in Bulgaria at U.S. request, lawyer says

Bulgarian authorities last week arrested an accused Russian cybercriminal based on an Interpol warrant that originated with prosecutors from the Eastern District of New York, a lawyer familiar with the case told CyberScoop. Alexander Zhukov, a Russian national, was apprehended by police after he was indicted in absentia by U.S. prosecutors, according to Arkady Bukh, a New York-based attorney with a history of representing suspected hackers from Eastern Europe. Bukh now is in negotiations to represent Zhukov, he said Wednesday. Prosecutors accused Zhukov of affiliate fraud, Bukh said. Affiliate fraud typically involves artificially inflating internet traffic to defraud marketers, charging advertisers for access to website visitors who don’t exist. “There is widespread fraud from huge amounts of traffic getting directed through botnets,” said Bukh, describing the rise of ad fraud in general. “Before, it was boys and girls in Russia sitting in boiler rooms clicking manual clicks in order to get […]

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