The U.S. Department of Justice has charged five men with phishing attacks on employees of multiple companies, obtaining employee credentials and stealing millions of dollars from cryptocurrency accounts, Decrypt reported.
The five young men, aged between 20 and 25, were indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of wire fraud conspiracy, conspiracy and aggravated identity theft. Some of them have already faced charges and have pleaded not guilty.
They are allegedly part of the hacker group "Scattered Spider" that attacked Caesars Entertainment and MGM Resorts International and typically conducts data theft and extortion through a variety of social engineering techniques.
If convicted, each defendant could face a maximum sentence of 20 years for the wire fraud conspiracy charge, up to five years for the conspiracy charge, and two years for the aggravated identity theft charge, consecutive to the charge.
U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said the cybercriminals carried out a sophisticated scheme to steal intellectual property and proprietary information worth tens of millions of dollars, and he warned that the growing sophistication of phishing and hacking attacks could result in huge losses.