Click-fraud Ringleader Indicted; Faces 25 Years in Prison
Posted by: Timothy Weaver on 07/11/2015 09:14 AM
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Vladimir Tsastsin, an Estonian national, is the ringleader of a massive click-fraud scheme, known as “Operation Ghost Click."
He has pleaded guilty to wire fraud and computer intrusion charges. He was involved in an international campaign that infected at least four million computers in 100 countries with DNSChanger malware.
Between 2007 and October 2011, Tsastsin and six other defendants – Timur Gerassimenko, Dmitri Jegorov, Valeri Aleksejev, Konstantin Poltev, Andrey Taame, and Anton Ivanov – “controlled and operated various companies that masqueraded as legitimate publisher networks in the Internet advertising industry.”
The FBI said: "The defendants fraudulently increased the traffic to the websites and advertisements that would earn them money and made it appear to advertisers that the Internet traffic came from legitimate clicks and ad displays on the defendants' Publisher Networks when, in actuality, it had not."
Tsastsin faces up to 25 years in prison for both charges – one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion.
Source: SCMagazine
He has pleaded guilty to wire fraud and computer intrusion charges. He was involved in an international campaign that infected at least four million computers in 100 countries with DNSChanger malware.Between 2007 and October 2011, Tsastsin and six other defendants – Timur Gerassimenko, Dmitri Jegorov, Valeri Aleksejev, Konstantin Poltev, Andrey Taame, and Anton Ivanov – “controlled and operated various companies that masqueraded as legitimate publisher networks in the Internet advertising industry.”
The FBI said: "The defendants fraudulently increased the traffic to the websites and advertisements that would earn them money and made it appear to advertisers that the Internet traffic came from legitimate clicks and ad displays on the defendants' Publisher Networks when, in actuality, it had not."
Tsastsin faces up to 25 years in prison for both charges – one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion.
Source: SCMagazine
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