Estonian criminal extradited to U.S.

Jul 14, 2008
TBT staff in cooperation with BNS

Photo: Steve Woods

NEW YORK- Estonian computer criminal, Alexander Suvorov is likely to be extradited to the United States where he is suspected hacking into computer systems and selling stolen information for hefty amounts of money.

The US Secret Service arrested Suvorov, and a young man carrying an Estonian passport, in Frankfurt on Main on March 3 when he was attempting to fly with his girl-friend to Indonesia reports Der Spiegel.

The magazine wrote that the young man was known as Jonny Hell and was believed to belong to the world's biggest gang trading credit card numbers.

His detention has created problems in US-German relations, as US agents are likely to have acted on their own, without informing the German authorities.

According to Der Speigel the US Secret Service had been tracking Suvorov for three years and observed the couple while they were out shopping in central Frankfurt. But he was not arrested in central Frankfurt because this would have affected American-German relations.

A German court must now decide whether Suvorov will be extradited to the United States.

At the time of his arrest, the hacker had not touched German data banks. But he has obtained millions of credit card number in other countries and is said to have caused damages of over 100 million dollars.

If the U.S.’s suspicions are true, it is the biggest and most sensational computer crime of modern times, the publication wrote.

Currently the German court and the man's lawyer have no idea what role Suvorov is playing in this situation, as the U.S. information is highly classified.

The official extradition application only describes a case in which Suvorov hacked into the administration computer of the restaurant chain Dave & Buster and transferred the credit card numbers of the more than 5,000 clients of the chain to Estonia.

Jonny Hell gave the number to one of his accomplices who sold them to the highest bidder on the black market.

According to Der Spiegel Suvorov has denied the accusations.

AFP reported that in addition to Suvorov, Ukrainian Maksim Jastremski and Albert Gonzales, a resident of Miami, were also suspected of working with Suvorov.

The latter two men have been detained. Turkish authorities arrested Jastremski in July 2007 for different breaches of the law and he is currently in prison there. Gonzales was arrested in Miami.

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