The U.S. Division of Justice (DoJ) has unveiled an indictment towards Alireza Shafie Nasab, a 39-year-old Iranian nationwide, for his function in a cyber-espionage marketing campaign concentrating on U.S. authorities and protection entities.
The marketing campaign was energetic from no less than 2016 till April 2021 and focused over a dozen American organizations, together with the Departments of the Treasury and State, varied protection contractors, and New York-based accounting and hospitality firms.
The defendant and his co-conspirators reportedly used specialised instruments to launch phishing assaults towards American organizations whereas working as an IT specialist for Iranian agency Mahak Rayan Afraz, compromising no less than 200,000 computer systems.
The U.S. DoJ announcement says Nasab’s job with Mahak Rayan Afraz was merely a entrance for the hacker’s malicious operations.
“Whereas purporting to work as a cybersecurity specialist for Iran-based shoppers, Mr. Nasab allegedly participated in a persistent marketing campaign to compromise U.S. non-public sector and authorities pc methods,” said Matthew G. Olsen, DoJ’s Assistant Lawyer Common.
“Alireza Shafie Nasab [allegedly] participated in a cyber marketing campaign utilizing spear phishing and different hacking strategies to contaminate greater than 200,000 sufferer gadgets, a lot of which contained delicate or labeled protection data,” added U.S. Lawyer Damian Williams.
Along with the phishing assaults, the Iranian hackers employed social engineering techniques, primarily by impersonating girls to trick targets into putting in malware on their gadgets.
The U.S. authorities say Nasab had a major involvement in these schemes, procuring infrastructure and registering servers and electronic mail accounts for use within the cyber-espionage marketing campaign utilizing stolen identities.
The Iranian hacker now faces fees referring to conspiracy to commit pc and wire fraud, wire fraud, and aggravated id theft, which incur between 5 and 20 years in jail, plus a compulsory two-year sentence for id theft.
The U.S. Division of State’s Rewards for Justice Program now presents up to $10 million for data resulting in Nasab’s identification or location.
Anybody with data on Nasab’s whereabouts is requested to submit their tricks to the next Tor handle: he5dybnt7sr6cm32xt77pazmtm65flqy6irivtflruqfc5ep7eiodiad.onion.
