Two Iranian nationals have been indicted on charges of hacking into US computer networks and stealing data to sell on the black market — sometimes at the behest of the Iranian government, federal prosecutors announced.
Hooman Heidarian, 30, and Mehdi Farhadi, 34, both of Hamedan, Iran, were accused Wednesday of stealing and selling hundreds of terabytes of data, including some national security intelligence, nuclear information, intellectual property and personal financial information, the Justice Department alleged in a charging announcement.
“We will not bring the rule of law to cyberspace until governments refuse to provide safe harbor for criminal hacking within their borders,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers said in a statement.
“Unfortunately, our cases demonstrate that at least four nations — Iran, China, Russia and North Korea — will allow criminal hackers to victimize individuals and companies from around the world, as long as these hackers will also work for that country’s government — gathering information on human rights activists, dissidents and others of intelligence interest. Today’s defendants will now learn that such service to the Iranian regime is not an asset, but a criminal yoke that they will now carry until the day they are brought to justice.”
The men are at large, believed to be in Iran, and are wanted by the FBI.
On Wednesday, the Justice Department also unsealed charges against five Chinese nationals for their alleged hacking of over 100 companies in the US and overseas, including social media companies, universities, nonprofit organizations and think tanks, as well as activists and politicians in Hong Kong.
In its announcement, the department said the five Chinese citizens were at large in China.
Two other individuals from Malaysia were also indicted. They were arrested by Malaysian authorities Monday on charges of conspiring with two of the Chinese hackers to “profit from computer intrusions targeting the video game industry.”
In that indictment, Demers warned that “China has now taken its place, alongside Russia, Iran and North Korea, in that shameful club of nations that provide a safe haven for cybercriminals in exchange for those criminals being ‘on call’ to work for the benefit of the state, here to feed the Chinese Communist Party’s insatiable hunger for American and other non-Chinese companies’ hard-earned intellectual property, including COVID-19 research.”
With Post wires
