Eight foot soldiers of an international cyber-crime ring have been charged in a staggering ripoff of ATMs that netted $45 million worldwide, law enforcement officials said Thursday.
“Instead of using masks and guns, this cyber-crime organization used laptops and malware," Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch said.
The caper marked the biggest theft of bank cash in the city since the infamous 1978 Lufthansa heist of $5.8 million at Kennedy Airport.
Officials said the Yonkers-based “cashing crew” was activated on both Dec. 22 and Feb. 19 by computer hackers overseas to carry out a series of highly sophisticated, coordinated withdrawals of $2.8 million from hundreds of bank machines in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens until all the cash was gone.
Their counterparts were simultaneously ripping off ATMs in 24 countries around the world, while their hacker superiors carefully monitored the withdrawal activity.
Lynch likened the thieves to a “virtual flash mob” that fanned out in the city with fraudulent debit cards.
The first cyber-attack targeted pre-paid Master Card debit cards issued by the National Bank of Ras Al-Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates. The second invasion penetrated computers of Bank of Muscat in Oman.
The hackers obtained debit card data, eliminated withdrawal limits on the accounts, created access codes and then sent a network of operatives out to withdraw money in multiple cities in North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia, authorities said.
Investigators have seized cell phone photos of the thieves posing with piles of cash.
“They seemed star-struck themselves by the amount of money they had looted," Lynch said.
The reputed ringleader of the New York crew, Alberto Yusi Lajud-Pena, was murdered in the Dominican Republic on April 27.
Named in the indictment unsealed in Brooklyn Federal Court are Jael Mejia Collado, 23, Joan Luis Minier Lara, 22, Evan Pena, 35, Jose Familia Reyes, 24, Elvis Rodriguez, 24, Emir Yeje, 24 and Chung Yu-Holguin, 22, all of Yonkers.
Two of the defendants are school bus drivers in New York City, a source said.
The withdrawals were fast and furious. In New York, the crew grabbed nearly $400,000 in 700 transactions during the December attack, according to court papers. The February attack reaped $2.4 million from 3,000 bank withdrawals over a 10-hour spree.
After kicking up a share to the hackers, the crew purchased Rolex watches, a Porsche sedan and a Mercedes Benz SUV.
ATM surveillance camera photos show Reyes at multiple bank windows and depict his backpack getting fuller as it is filled with cash.
Officials refused to discuss the ongoing investigation of the computer hackers, but noted they do not appear to be based in the U.S.
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