In the Dark Web world of cyber hackers, "Slavik" achieved legendary stature years ago, then purportedly retired. Instead, authorities say he went on a dazzling crime spree that used more than 1 million infected computers to reach directly into U.S. banks and businesses to steal millions.
The details of Slavik's handiwork continued to spill out Tuesday after the FBI named him as a leader of a computer crime syndicate that spanned several continents and funneled money around the globe — often without being detected.
The FBI has identified Slavik as Evgeniy Mikhailovitch Bogachev, a Russian national whose whereabouts remain a mystery. Prosecutors say he is responsible for two of the most sophisticated and destructive forms of malicious software in existence — Gameover Zeus and CryptoLocker
His alleged bank heists topped $100 million, including nearly $7 million from a bank in North Florida, $374,000 from a PNC bank account belonging to a plastics company in Pennsylvania, and $190,800 from the bank account owned by an assisted-living facility in Pennsylvania, court papers say.
Bogachev allegedly controlled a vast worldwide network that included computers in Canada, Germany, La Belle France, Luxembourg, Iran, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. But the backbone of the infrastructure resided in the Ukraine, according to a senior U.S. law enforcement official who was not authorized to speak publicly because of the pending court cases.
The operation to dismantle the network began on May 7 in Donetsk and Kiev, Ukraine, two cities convulsing with political violence. Ukrainian police seized and copied key computers in the network, prosecutors said. On Friday, the FBI, working with police around the world, kicked off a 72-hour operation to shut down every command-and-control computer in the Zeus network.
By Saturday, CryptoLocker had ceased working. By Monday, police had freed more than 300,000 computers from the Zeus network.
Bogachev, 30, who lives luxuriously in Anapa, Russia, a beautiful seaside resort town of 60,000 on the northern coast of the Black Sea, and often sails his yacht to various Black Sea ports, remains a runaway.
[REUTERS] The United States on Thursday cut aid to Uganda, imposed visa restrictions and canceled a regional military exercise in response to a Ugandan law that imposes harsh penalties on homosexuality. Cultural imperialism, anyone?
The White House said in a statement the measures were intended to "reinforce our support for human rights of all Ugandans regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity." "We will impose our values on anyone smaller than we are that we can bully."
Homosexuality is taboo in most African countries and illegal in 37, including in Uganda where it has been a crime since British rule. But pro or con or neutral, it's their problem, not ours.
Uganda's new law, signed by President Yoweri Museveni in February, imposes jail terms of up to life for "aggravated homosexuality" which includes homosexual sex with a minor or while HIV-positive. It's a good thing there aren't any more urgent problems in the world at this moment.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/20/2014 00:00 ||
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The White House said in a statement the measures were intended to "reinforce our support for human rights of all Ugandans regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity."
Not surprising. We leaned on the Saudis the same way, right? What's that? You don't say! Well, I'm sure that is different. Somehow.
#3
In fact we're not coming back, or sending any more aid until you completely renounce what those evil colonial missionaries taught you about Christianity, the scriptures, sex, animals, sanitation, diet, etc.
#4
So what is the Islamic take on homosexuality as long as you're putting stuff like this into effect? Or is it one set of rules for the Brotherhood and another set for Christians?
[Telegraph UK]Russia is secretly working with environmental groups campaigning against fracking in an attempt to maintain Europe's dependence on energy imports from Moscow, the secretary-general of Nato has said. I wonder if the KGB is doing this in the USA? Do bears poop in the woods?
Greenpeace dismissed Mr. Rasmussen's comments as "preposterous". Who is funding Greenpeace again? The bear... May be part of the deal that sprung those watermelons last fall.
[Iran Press TV] Ukraine's new president says he will sign the economic portion of an association pact with the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... next week.
On Thursday, Petro Poroshenko announced the plan to sign the pact on June 27 during a parliamentary vote of confidence for the new foreign minister, Pavlo Klimkin. The political part of the agreement was signed by interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk back in March.
The economic section asks Ukraine to open its doors to EU's free trade zone.
One condition set by the EU economic deal is that Kiev should lift import barriers. Ukraine has imposed restrictions on EU products to protect farmers and steel mills in the industrial east from direct EU competition.
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06/20/2014 00:00 ||
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Ukraine has imposed restrictions on EU products to protect farmers and steel mills in the industrial east from direct EU competition.
[BLOOMBERG] Felipe VI, proclaimed King of Spain today, pledged to lead a process of national renewal, saying all Spaniards should be able to live together within the nation.
"The constitution recognized our diversity as a characteristic that defines our identity," Felipe said in the National Parliament in Madrid after swearing an oath of loyalty to the 1978 constitution.
"There is space for everyone," he said. "All feelings and sensibilities, all the ways of feeling Spanish. Feelings, particularly at a time of European construction, should never cause conflict, divide, or exclude people." He used the Catalan, Basque and Galician languages as well as Spanish to thank his audience at the end of his speech.
Felipe, 46, takes the throne from his father, Juan Carlos, with Spain facing challenges to its territorial and moral integrity and the economy emerging from a six-year slump.
Posted by: Fred ||
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There is space for everyone," he said. "All feelings and sensibilities, all the ways of feeling Spanish. Feelings, particularly at a time of European construction, should never cause conflict, divide, or exclude people.""
"Except for you fooking Moors"
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/20/2014 14:54 Comments ||
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all Spaniards should be able to live together within the nation
May I advance the notion of establishing a 'Kickstart' program to fund charter flights from TX and AZ with 'loads' of non-resident Spanish speakers. There's space for them back in the old mother country.
[Iran Press TV] A court in the Turkish city of Istanbul has ruled that 230 military officers sentenced to lengthy jail terms for allegedly plotting against the government should be released.
Turkey's local media said on Thursday that the 4th Heavy Penal Court of Istanbul's Anatolia Courthouse ordered the release of the military officers, saying their jail sentences should be suspended until they stand a retrial.
Some of the officers were reportedly released on Thursday afternoon.
The ruling came a day after Turkey's Constitutional Court announced that the original trial of the officers has been flawed and their rights have been violated.
The request for the retrial had formally been proposed by the Turkish army in December last year.
"We share with all our heart the happiness of our personnel and their families and hope that their new trial will reach a just verdict," Turkey's Chief of Staff General Necdet Ozel said in a statement, welcoming the verdict.
Back in September 2012, a tribunal near Istanbul handed down 13 to 20-year jail terms to scores of officers and retired generals on charges of plotting to overthrow Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi only they haven't dumped him yet... 's government in 2003.
The ruling came under criticism by rights groups who questioned its impartiality.
The officers were also accused of plotting to bomb mosques and trying to trigger a conflict with neighboring Greece in order to justify a military coup.
Posted by: Fred ||
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The Soviets did more or less the same thing when the Germans attacked.
h/t Instapundit
For the first time since World War II, the number of people forced from their homes worldwide has surged past 50 million, the United Nations refugee agency said Friday.
Syrians fleeing the devastating civil war and a fast-growing web of other world crises accounted for the spike in the displaced, the UNHCR said in its annual Global Trends Report.
I still have a hard time with NRO being declassified.
The U.S. Air Force has begun the process of conducting the first launch services competition since awarding the monopoly United Launch Alliance (ULA) an exclusive 36-core deal last year that sparked a lawsuit from upstart competitor SpaceX.
The Air Force posted a draft request for proposals June 4 to loft the National Reconnaissance Offices NROL-79 satellite next year.
Officials hope to get the work on contract this year, but that could be a thorny path as SpaceX cannot win national security launch work without certification. And its certification plan, which company President Gwynne Shotwell and launch program executive officer Lt. Gen. Ellen Pawlikowski both describe as ambitious, is slated to take all year.
On the flip side, this could be SpaceXs first chance to win national security work since the Air Forces issuance of the multi-billion-dollar December contract prompted the company to slap the service with a lawsuit claiming anticompetitive practices.
[Rooters] MANILA -- Philippine and American troops are set to hold naval exercises this month near a disputed shoal, which will almost certainly anger China with tension already high in the South China Sea.
China claims 90 percent of the South China Sea, potentially rich in oil and gas and fisheries.
The Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Vietnam and Taiwan also claim parts of the waters, and China has viewed with suspicion what it sees as U.S. moves to "provoke" tension by supporting its regional allies, notably Vietnam and the Philippines.
Vietnam and the US are regional allies? Who knew? Must be ValJar's doing.
It'd be the first reasonable thing she's done then...
Five warships, including a U.S. guided-missile destroyer, and about 1,000 troops will take part in week-long Cooperation Afloat Readiness and Training (CARAT) exercises, which include live-fire drills 40 miles off Zambales, on the western shores of the Philippine island of Luzon.
#4
I can think of another good reason not to come to the aid of Vietnam: the administration has as its secretary of state not just the sort of person who would sell them out, but a person who did. And if the left is always gonna undo every victory we achieve on the battlefield, whether in Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghanistan, there's no real point in supporting any sort of aggressive foreign policy.
[CNSNEWS] Public confidence in television news is at an all-time low, according to a survey released today by Gallup.
Only 18 percent of the Americans surveyed expressed either a "great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in that news medium.
Gallup has been asking the following question annually since 1993: "Now I am going to read you a list of institutions in American society. Please tell me how much confidence you, yourself, have in each one--a great deal, quite a lot, some or very little?" (See Gallup Confidence Survey.pdf) One of the institutions listed is "television news."
Posted by: Fred ||
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I would like to see an age demographic of that %18.
#2
Another example of the demographic 'die off' in effect. The remaining percent may be dwindling but at least they have money the program sponsors are looking for.
#3
I have an 84 year old widowed brother-in-law who has successfully flipped the switch. No newspapers, no Fox News or CNN. His greatest mystery is what the 'Meals on Wheels' lady will be bringing for dinner, and the Sunday church brunch menu. It took a mild stroke, but he seems carefree and happier than most. Don't tell me providence is not in control.
#5
My confidence in TV news fell off the table when Walter Cronkite went bonkers over Hue and said we were losing the war when we were kicking Charlie's butt all over the field...
Throw in the nonsense and false information about Reagan about Iran Contra and Iraq...
I don't trust anyone on network TV and I barely trust a newspaper anymore. More often than not when I read an article about Obama, I assume the truth is about 180-degrees from what the article says.
Posted by: Bill Clinton ||
06/20/2014 13:57 Comments ||
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More often than not when I read an article about Obama, I assume the truth is about 180-degrees from what the article says.
That is exactly why I find Susan Rice to be so helpful.
#7
My confidence in TV news fell off the table when Walter Cronkite went bonkers over Hue and said we were losing the war when we were kicking Charlie's butt all over the field...
That would be the Walter Cronkite who was a reporter in the ETO when the Germans kicked solid ass in the Ardennes destroying an entire American division and taking a load of POWs. Another surprise attack. Even though the line was stabilized and the bulge was pushed back, the costs in personnel were far beyond any of the losses in Tet. Yet one was triumphed in the media as a resounding victory, the other a defeat, though when the dust settled we held the same territory as before the battle and the enemy's ranks were severely mauled. That Walter? /rhetorical question
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Telegraph UK]Russia is secretly working with environmental groups campaigning against fracking in an attempt to maintain Europe's dependence on energy imports from Moscow, the secretary-general of Nato has said.
[BLOOMBERG] Felipe VI, proclaimed King of Spain today, pledged to lead a process of national renewal, saying all Spaniards should be able to live together within the nation.
[Rooters] MANILA -- Philippine and American troops are set to hold naval exercises this month near a disputed shoal, which will almost certainly anger China with tension already high in the South China Sea.
