A Russian hacker prosecuted in Georgia for his involvement in a $50 million cyberfraud ring was among a historic prisoner exchange Thursday involving at least seven countries, according to multiple media reports.
Roman Seleznev, 40, was one of several Russians released as part of the deal that secured the return of American journalist Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, Associated Press and other major news outlets reported.
Seleznev, the son of a Russian politician, was sentenced by an Atlanta judge in late 2017 to 14 years in prison for, among other things, defrauding former Atlanta-based Royal Bank of Scotland’s WorldPay of millions of dollars. He took a plea deal with Georgia prosecutors after being found guilty in a separate case in Washington, where he was sentenced to 27 years in prison.
WorldPay, which processes credit and debit card transactions for financial institutions and merchants, was hacked by Seleznev and others in November 2008. Hackers accessed 45.5 million debit card numbers, cracked personal identification numbers and inflated account balances so that “cashers,” including Seleznev, were able to withdraw more than $9.4 million dollars from 2,100 ATMs in 280 cities around the world in less than 12 hours.
The Federal Bureau of Prisons did not immediately respond to questions about Seleznev, but he did not appear on Thursday in the agency’s inmate database.
Atlanta attorney Kamal Ghali prosecuted Seleznev in the Georgia case, which included charges transferred from Nevada. Ghali said the WorldPay hack in Georgia was “at the time probably the most sophisticated cyberattack ever.”
“(Seleznev) played an important role in it,” Ghali told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “He was one of the lead cashers.”
Seleznev, who used aliases including Track2, Bulba, Psycho and Ncux, was ordered to pay $50.8 million in restitution in relation to the Nevada charges and $2.1 million to WorldPay as part of the Georgia case.
He admitted as part of his plea deal that he had become associated with the Carder.su organization, an identity theft and credit card fraud ring, in 2009. Members trafficked in compromised credit card account data and counterfeit identifications, resulting in losses to victims totaling at least $50.8 million, prosecutors said.
Seleznev, who never lived in Georgia, was arrested by U.S. agents in 2014 while vacationing in the Maldives and was taken to Guam to await trial. At the time, Russian authorities described Seleznev’s arrest as a “kidnapping.”
RBS WorldPay became Worldpay in a 2018 acquisition by Vantiv, public records show. It was acquired in 2019 by Fidelity National Information Services as part of a $43 billion deal and is now headquartered in Ohio.
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