Marcus Hutchins, who hails from the United Kingdom, has been convicted as a suspect linked to the malware spread during July 2014 and July 2015. Hutchins was taken into custody on 2nd August after a hacking conference in Las Vegas.
The charge claimed that the 23-year-old created and promoted a banking Trojan, which goes by the name of “Kronos” on different internet forums alongside unnamed colleagues. According to the filing, the Britisher is convicted for six separate crimes of hacking.
The revealed filings charged Hutchins for committing an offence against 10 or more protected computers during a 1-year period from July 2014 to July 2015.
The filing also revealed, that on 29 April 2015, one of the defendants had advertised the Kronos banking Trojan on AlphaBay, which was the most popular place for marketing in the hacking world back then.
However, AlphaBay was recently taken down by a global cybercrime operation, where FBI, Dutch police and Europol collaborated together and made multiple arrests.
According to a cybersecurity firm, the Kronos virus spread through email, and targeted the areas of United Kingdom and North America. Moreover, researches also revealed that the malware targeted different sectors including schooling, banking and hospitality.
However, Hutchins also grew famous for stopping a global virus attack this past May. The “WannaCry” malware caused a global panic, and spread to more than 300,000 different computers in 150 countries, and also caused harm to the UK health service. Hutchins carried out a research of a sample of the virus, and found that it had been connected to a specific unregistered domain. Hutchins bought that domain, and thus ended the effective spread of the WannaCry malware.
Hutchins was arrested after the Defcon hacking conference in Las Vegas
However, Hutchins has recently been arrested and was initially held in Nevada at the Henderson Detention Centre, but was then moved to an unknown facility.
According to the looks of his Twitter account, Hutchins was arrested after the Defcon hacking conference in Las Vegas, as he was about to fly away from America.
UK’s National Cyber Security Centre confirmed that they knew a Britisher was held in custody and insisted that it was a law enforcement matter, and decided not to comment on it any further. On the other hand, FBI has not yet released any statements on the arrest of the 23-year-old.
Several of Hutchins colleagues, and admirers, hail him as the hero who stopped the globally spreading malware of “WannaCry” that hacked into computers and used to demand ransom for releasing their files. The virus did not just spread over 300,000 computers, but also affected more than 10,000 organizations.
Moreover, reports also confirm that more than $140,000 were being emptied out of online accounts, linked with the illegal profit made from the “WannaCry” malware. The money was captured in a form of digital currency called bitcoin, however, no involvement is linked to Hutchins related to these money transfers.
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