Romanian hacker sentenced to jail in the United States
Romanian hacker Mihai Ionuț Păunescu, also known as "Virus," has been sentenced to three years in prison in the United States for facilitating the transmission of destructive malware.
Radu Dumitrescu · Journalist
· Updated · 2 min read
Romanian hacker Mihai Ionuț Păunescu, also known as "Virus," has been sentenced to three years in prison in the United States for facilitating the transmission of destructive malware.
Păunescu, 39, is from Bucharest and was sentenced to three years in jail at the Federal Court in Manhattan for conspiracy to commit "computer intrusions," as reported by the US Department of Justice and cited by Startupcafe.ro. He pleaded guilty.
The hacker allegedly operated a "bulletproof hosting" service that allowed hackers to distribute viruses such as Gozi, Trojan, SpyEye, and BlackEnergy. Some of these viruses were designed to steal confidential financial information.
He also facilitated other cybercrimes, including initiating and executing distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and transmitting spam messages.
"Păunescu operated a bulletproof hosting service that allowed hackers from around the world to spread malware through which confidential financial information was stolen, websites were crashed, and other damages were caused," stated Damian Williams, the federal prosecutor in New York.
“By providing cybercriminals with the means to engage in illegal activities online without revealing their true identities, the hosting service operated by Păunescu would shield his clients, the hackers, from authorities and cybersecurity professionals," he added.
The Romanian hacker facilitated the spread of "some of the most serious types of malware at the time" and "derived substantial profit" from this activity, agreed Judge Lorna G. Schofield during the sentencing.
The Gozi virus is malware that steals personal information, including usernames and passwords, from the affected computer users' bank accounts. Designed to evade antivirus programs, Gozi infected over a million computers worldwide, including at least 40,000 in the US, including computers belonging to NASA, as well as computers in Germany, the United Kingdom, Poland, France, Finland, Italy, Turkey, and other countries. Individuals, companies, and government entities whose computers were infected with this virus suffered losses of tens of millions of dollars, according to the US Department of Justice.
Similar to Gozi, Zeus, and SpyEye were created to steal confidential financial information from victims' computers. On the other hand, BlackEnergy was initially designed to launch DDoS attacks targeting websites and was later updated to allow the theft of login credentials.
