Hacker-for-hire pleads guilty to Yahoo breach

SAN FRANCISCO: A Canadian man pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a massive breach at Yahoo that authorities say was directed by two Russian intelligence agents and affected at least a half billion user accounts.

Karim Baratov appeared in a jail jumpsuit before a federal judge and entered the pleas to one count of conspiracy to commit computer fraud and abuse and eight counts of aggravated identity theft. He gave only “yes” and “no” answers to questions from the judge.

He is scheduled for sentencing on Feb 20 next year.

US law enforcement officials call the 22-year-old Baratov a “hackerfor-hire” and say as part of his plea deal, he acknowledged hacking more than 11,000 webmail accounts on behalf of the Russian Federal Security Service, or FSB, and other customers from around 2010 until his March arrest.

Outside court on Tuesday, Baratov’s attorneys said their client hacked only eight accounts for the Russians and did not know that he was working for Russian agents connected to the Yahoo breach.

Baratov was arrested in Hamilton, Ontario, and later agreed to forego an extradition hearing and face the US charges. “He’s been transparent and forthright with the government since he got here,” said one of his attorneys, Andrew Mancilla.

The Russian agents, Dmitry Dokuchaev and Igor Sushchin, used the information they stole from Yahoo to spy on Russian journalists, US and Russian government officials and employees of financial services and other private businesses, according to prosecutors.