Russian Extradited To U.S. To Face Charges Over Hacking Of Wall Street Firms

Georgia has extradited a Russian man to the United States to face charges that he took part in a massive computer hacking scheme that targeted JPMorgan Chase & Co and other Wall Street firms, U.S. prosecutors announced on September 7.

Andrei Tyurin, 35, was arrested in Georgia at the request of U.S. authorities, according to U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. His lawyer, Florian Miedel, declined to comment on the charges.

Tyurin is the latest person charged in connection with one of the largest data breaches ever. Wall Street giant JPMorgan disclosed the breach in 2014 and said it had exposed information associated with about 83 million customer accounts.

Other victims included web-based Wall Street brokers E*Trade and Scottrade, as well as Dow Jones & Co, the publisher of the Wall Street Journal. Prosecutors said a total of more than 100 million customers of the hacked companies were affected.

Prosecutors said the scheme was led by Gery Shalon, an Israeli who is already facing charges over the hack in a U.S. court in Manhattan along with two other Israelis, Joshua Samuel Aaron and Ziv Orenstein.

According to prosecutors, participants in the scheme used hacked information to further other crimes, with Tyurin, Shalon and the other conspirators making hundreds of millions of dollars through their alleged criminal schemes.

Tyurin is charged with computer hacking, wire fraud, and conspiracy. The most serious charges carry a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison.