Authorities extradited a 36-year-old Russian national from the Republic of Georgia under accusations of widespread bank-account takeover attacks, including a scheme to defraud two banks of more than $6.3 million, the Justice Department said Tuesday.
Sergei Anatolyevich Filimonov and unnamed co-conspirators ran an extensive operation starting in November 2023 to spoof domains of banks, obtain credentials of legitimate customers and use those details to steal money from accounts with large balances, according to court records.
Filimonov and his co-conspirators allegedly collected more than 5,000 victim login credentials to various banks, including those assigned to employees with access to a company headquartered in Atlanta and another business with offices in Cumming, Ga.
Authorities said Filimonov and his co-conspirators registered and maintained spoofed domains of banks, purchased sponsored links to direct unsuspecting victims to those domains, and stole credentials from those banks’ customers when they attempted to log into the fraudulent sites.
The alleged bank-account takeover crew also created infrastructure to store victim login credentials and tricked victims into providing additional details to bypass security controls.