Category Archives: Kusok

Russian scammer ‘Kusok,’ who stole $1.5 million via tax fraud, sentenced to 5 years

Posted on by

A U.S. federal judge on Wednesday sentenced a Russian man to five years in prison for his role in a scheme to use malicious software to steal the equivalent of $1.5 million in tax returns meant for American taxpayers.  Anton Bogdanov, 35, worked as part of a small crew that used vulnerabilities in accounting software to redirect tax refunds into their own accounts. By logging into the software, Bogdanov and his associates would access customer information and change the recipient information, directing money from the Internal Revenue Service to debit cards under their control, according to an indictment.  Bogdanov, who was better known by the alias “Kusok,” lived in Russia during the crime spree, and would take a cut of the stolen money. He was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand in November 2018 while waiting to board a flight to Russia, becoming one of a number of accused cybercriminals whom U.S. […]

The post Russian scammer ‘Kusok,’ who stole $1.5 million via tax fraud, sentenced to 5 years appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Russian scammer ‘Kusok,’ who stole $1.5 million via tax fraud, sentenced to 5 years→

Russian charged with stealing $1.5 million in hacks on U.S. tax preparers

Posted on by

U.S. authorities have charged a Russian citizen in a scam that netted $1.5 million through bogus tax returns between June 2014 and November 2016, the Department of Justice announced Monday. Anton Bogdanov — who went by “Kusok,” according to court documents — is accused of computer intrusion, aggravated identity theft and other wrongdoing as part of his alleged role in a plot to combine hacking with traditional fraud techniques to steal money from the U.S. government. Bogdanov and others leveraged access to hacked computers at private U.S. tax preparation firms to steal individuals’ personal information, exploiting a vulnerability in an unnamed remote access program used by accountants to log in from home and while traveling, according to the indictment. They allegedly would use that access to change the information on victims’ tax returns, and redirect their refunds to debit cards under the thieves’ control, according to the Justice Department. Those debit cards […]

The post Russian charged with stealing $1.5 million in hacks on U.S. tax preparers appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Russian charged with stealing $1.5 million in hacks on U.S. tax preparers→