The Justice Department Has Indicted Multiple Russian Hackers For Attacks On Yahoo

The 2016 American presidential election apparently isn’t the only thing Russian hackers allegedly meddled with. In September, Yahoo announced a massive data breach by which unknown assailants gained access to over 200 million users’ data. Subsequent reports revealed the hack was at least twice as big, and that Yahoo suspected the attacks may have been state sponsored. Three months later, the company was hacked again — causing potential buyer Verizon to rethink its deal before ultimately proceeding as planned. Now it seems U.S. Justice Department officials investigating the matter have identified the parties responsible, and are posed to apprehend them.

According to Bloomberg, the Justice Department is prepared to indict four individuals for “participating in massive online security breaches” targeting Yahoo’s user data. One of the suspects is located somewhere in Canada and, with the help of Canadian law enforcement, U.S. officials will arrest that person “as soon as Tuesday.” The other three, however, are supposedly located somewhere in Russia and will require cooperation between American and Russian officials. As for the precise nature of these matters, neither the Justice Department, Canadian official, or anyone with knowledge on Russia’s end confirmed anything with Bloomberg.

An official announcement is expected by the Justice Department a press conference in Washington, D.C. scheduled for 11:30 am EST.

UPDATE – 11:40 am EST: Eric Geller of Politico is live-tweeting developments in this story. He indicates that, as predicted, indictments have been handed out to multiple alleged Russian hackers, two of which are Russian Federal Security Service officers. The attackers zeroed in on Yahoo accounts belonging to U.S. and Russian government officials.

(Via Bloomberg)