Fixxx
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One of the developers of the Raccoon stealer has been sentenced to five years in prison in the United States. The individual in question is 28-year-old Ukrainian citizen Mark Sokolovsky, who was arrested in the Netherlands in March 2022 at the request of the FBI.
"Sokolovsky is responsible for the compromise of 52 million credentials. These were used for fraudulent purposes, to steal other personal data, and in ransomware attacks that affected millions of people worldwide", stated FBI Special Agent Aaron Tapp.
Court documents reveal that Sokolovsky operated under the aliases raccoon-stealer, Photix and black21jack77777. Along with his accomplices, he rented out the stealer to cybercriminals. A weekly subscription cost $75, while a monthly subscription was priced at $200. He has now been ordered to pay a fine of nearly $24,000 and to compensate for damages amounting to approximately $911,000. Following Sokolovsky's arrest in the Netherlands in 2022, the infrastructure of the version of Raccoon he was associated with was also dismantled. Representatives of the stealer initially claimed that the shutdown of the infrastructure was due to the disappearance of an employee responsible for it during the conflict in Ukraine. In October of the same year, they acknowledged that it was indeed Sokolovsky. In February 2024, he was extradited to the United States, and in October, he pleaded guilty and entered into a plea deal with the prosecution.