Four international cyberthieves were recently caught in a massive scheme to bank in on Internet advertisements. According to officials, the Rove group, as they call themselves, hijacked at least 4 million computers in the U.S. and made off with $14 million in "illegitimate income" before getting caught.
The accused hackers include six Estonian nationals and a Russian national who hacked into computers and rerouted Internet users to other websites for the past four years. The most popular sites included Netflix, iTunes, and the IRS and the malware used in the scheme rerouted users attempting to get to these sites to different websites. By rerouting users, the Rove group illegally cashed in on Internet advertising deals that they had made with various Internet advertisers.
The FBI recently broke up the scandal after a two-year investigation called Operation Ghost Click. The six Estonian nationals were arrested on cyber crime charges, but the Russian national is still at large.
