Kirill Victorovich Firsov, a Russian national accused of running a website dealing in the sale of stolen data, has been arrested in New York, the Department of Justice said Monday.
Mr. Firsov was apprehended Saturday at John F. Kennedy International Airport, federal prosecutors wrote in a filing entered in San Diego federal court.
He stands accused of managing the “Deer.io” site and accordingly enabling the sale of illegal goods and services including hacked and compromised data stolen from companies.
A probable cause statement cited by prosecutors describes Mr. Firsov as a “Russian cyber hacker” and administrator of Deer.io, “a Russian-based cyber platform” that essentially allows criminals to lease digital storefronts to sell their criminal products or services.
“Deer.io virtual stores offer for sale a variety of hacked and/or compromised U.S. and international financial and corporate data, Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and compromised user accounts from many U.S. companies. Individuals can also buy computer files, financial information, PII and usernames and passwords taken from computers infected with malicious software (malware) located both in the U.S. and abroad,” reads the court filing.
The FBI recently made several transactions over Deer.io, including purchasing hacked usernames and corresponding passwords associated with a San Diego-based video game company, as well as approximately 3,649 accounts containing personally identifiable information such as names, birthdates and Social Security numbers, according to the complaint.
Mr. Firsov is accordingly expected to be arraigned at a later date on one count each of aiding and abetting the trafficking of false authentication features and aiding and abetting the unauthorized solicitation of access devices.
Court filings did not list a lawyer for Mr. Firsov who could be reached for comment, and a message sent to an email address for Deer.io, was remained online Tuesday, was not immediately returned.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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