Collaborate Disseminate
It’s the Eastern District of New York’s biggest recovery from a cybercrime to date.
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A Russian man who once described himself as the “king of fraud” for his role in orchestrating a multimillion dollar crime spree was sentenced Wednesday to 10 years in prison. Aleksandr Zhukov, 41, was convicted in May of defrauding U.S. advertising companies out of $7 million in part by using networks of hacked computers, or botnets, to artificially inflate web traffic. Working with a small network of cybercriminals, Zhukov directed bot traffic to inauthentic websites, charging marketing companies to run advertisements on websites that attracted little, if any, real visitors. Two of Zhukov’s associates have pleaded guilty to involvement in the 3ve scheme, also known as Methbot, while six others have faced charges for the alleged roles in the effort. “Sitting at his computer keyboard in Bulgaria and Russia, Zhukov boldly devised and carried out an elaborate multi-million-dollar fraud against the digital advertising industry, and victimized thousands of companies across […]
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Nearly three years after he was arrested in a Belgium apartment, Aleksander Zhukov was seated in a Brooklyn courtroom this week to face charges of running a complex fraud scheme that netted millions of dollars. Zhukov, a Russian national, allegedly functioned as the ringleader of a scheme to use traditional cybercrime techniques to carry out a larger advertising fraud conspiracy, known as Methbot, that the U.S. Department of Justice says netted some $7 million between 2014 and 2016. The trial, scheduled to take place in the coming weeks in a Brooklen federal courtroom, is slated to include testimony from a range of FBI agents, cybersecurity executives and, as the prosecution said on Wednesday, a cooperating witness who worked with Zhukov to carry out the work. The ruse involved Zhukov’s use of a fake advertising company, which he used to charge marketing firms to run ads, prosecutors said during their opening […]
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A defense attorney for the head of an alleged cybercriminal conspiracy that defrauded American companies out of tens of millions of dollars is refusing to visit the defendant in a Brooklyn jail because of the COVID-19 pandemic. A lawyer for Aleksandr Zhukov, the accused boss of the Methbot/3ve advertising fraud conspiracy, informed a U.S. judge that they would no longer visit Zhukov behind bars to prepare for trial, according to a court filing submitted Friday. The attorney, who goes unnamed, cited unsafe conditions at the Metropolitan Detention Center, where Zhukov has been incarcerated for more than a year. Zhukov pleaded not guilty in January 2019 to charges that he functioned as the ringleader of the so-called Methbot fraud operation, which the U.S. Department of Justice described as an international scheme that bilked marketing companies out of $29 million. Zhukov allegedly led a group of eight accused scammers who used malicious software […]
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Scammers who have infiltrated the advertising ecosystem are using data centers to impersonate a range of connected devices in order to defraud marketers, according to new findings. New York-based security firm White Ops on Thursday disclosed a vast, ongoing scheme in which fraudsters are charging advertising companies for ad space on smart TVs, and then not delivering on their promise. To boost their credibility, the scammers are disguising bot activity which originates in global data centers as legitimate traffic in order to dupe anti-fraud services. The campaign, which White Ops has named Ice Bucket, is an updated version of the notorious Methbot/3ve scheme, in which scammers sold commercial advertising space in videos and websites that were never viewed by real humans. Methbot scammers earned roughly $29 million between 2014 and 2018, according to the Department of Justice, and also used data center traffic to seem legitimate. While White Ops declined […]
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The attorney for the accused ringleader of a $29 million cybercrime scheme is asking a U.S. federal judge to dismiss the case because the defendant is at risk of contracting COVID-19 behind bars. Aleksandr Zhukov’s lawyer argued in a court filing that U.S. authorities should release his client, who is currently incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in New York City, in part because he is accused of a nonviolent crime. Zhukov is scheduled to stand trial for allegedly directing an international advertising fraud ring in which scammers have admitted using a range of known hacking techniques to commandeer victims’ computers to view internet ads. Two members of the so-called Methbot/3ve conspiracy have pleaded guilty, while Zhukov has maintained his innocence in the effort to defraud victims out of $29 million. He has spent more than a year in the federal jail, where 14 inmates have tested positive for […]
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How Sergey Denisoff described his early ad-buying ventures: buying BS popup traffic and reselling it to buyers demanding BS traffic. Continue reading 9th Methbot suspect arrested in massive clickfraud ring
U.S. police have arrested another suspect in connection with an advertising fraud conspiracy that relied on run-of-the-mill hacking techniques to scam American companies out of roughly $30 million, according to new court documents. Police in New York City this month arrested Sergey Denisoff on charges that he allegedly helped members of the Methbot ad fraud crew by setting up dummy web pages where other conspirators could direct illegitimate traffic. Members then charged U.S. advertising companies for access to visitors who didn’t actually exist. Denisoff supplied fake domains, helped Methbot members circumvent cybersecurity software meant to stop this kind of fraud and was in regular communication with alleged ringleader Aleksandr Zhukov, an NYPD detective said in an affidavit first noticed by Seamus Hughes, the deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. Subsequent documents filed Jan. 19 in the Eastern District of New York indicate Denisoff was released on $100,000 bond. His […]
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Two men accused of participating in the multimillion-dollar Methbot digital-advertising fraud scheme are scheduled to plead guilty in the coming days, according to court filings from the Eastern District of New York. Sergey Ovysannikov and Yevgeniy Timchenko, both originally from Kazakhstan, are scheduled to appear in a federal courtroom in Brooklyn on Sept. 24 and Sept. 25, respectively, to enter plea agreements before Judge Steven M. Gold. Both men initially pleaded not guilty after they were extradited to the U.S. earlier this year. A third man, Methbot’s alleged ringleader, Aleksandr Zhukov, has promised to fight the charges against him. Prosecutors say the operation relied on cybercriminal techniques to defraud companies out of roughly $29 million. Few details of the plea agreements were immediately available. Arkady Bukh, defense counsel for Ovysannikov, declined to say to which counts his client intends to plead guilty. Attorneys for Timchenko did not respond Friday to phone […]
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The FBI’s investigation into the largest advertising fraud operation in recent memory isn’t over yet. An application for a search warrant filed by FBI Special Agent Evelina Aslanyana on Aug. 2 and made public this week shows that investigators are seeking access to email, LinkedIn and other data about accused members of the Methbot ad fraud operation, also known as 3ve. Eight suspects were indicted in November in the Eastern District of New York for alleged involvement in a scheme to defraud advertisers out of more than $30 million by using botnets and other technical means to artificially inflate web traffic to dummy websites. Investigators previously had said the operation was disrupted when the apparent ringleaders, led by Aleksandr Zhukov, were arrested last year. The fraud, which the FBI had classified into three distinct time periods, is still underway, according to the search warrant application. In the affidavit, the FBI refers […]
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