20 Years For Gonzalez In TJX Hacker Case

alphadogg writes "Hacker mastermind Albert Gonzalez was sentenced Thursday in US District Court to two concurrent 20-year stints in prison for his role in what prosecutors called the 'unparalleled' theft of millions of credit card numbers from major US retailers. US District Court Judge Patti B. Saris announced the concurrent sentences in two 2008 cases against Gonzalez, 28, a Cuban-American who was born in Miami, where he lived when the crimes were committed. Gonzalez and co-conspirators hacked into computer systems and stole credit card information from TJX, Office Max, DSW and Dave and Buster's, among other online retail outlets, in one of the largest — if not the largest — cybercrime operations targeting that sort of data thus far. They then sold the numbers to other criminals. Gonzalez pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges in two cases related to those thefts last December and the following day entered a guilty plea in a third case involving hacking into computer networks of Heartland Payment Systems and the Hannaford Supermarkets and 7-Eleven chains."

Comments

Re:So

[YrWrstNtmr]

So where is the crime if nothing was compromised?

I know reading the link is frowned upon in here, but the actual credit card numbers were lifted. Plus (FTA), "It also appears that those behind the breach "made off with the gold" by intercepting and stealing the so-called Track 2 data from the magnetic stripe on the back of cards, which is all that's needed to create counterfeit cards"

Re:TJX Case

[coolmoose25]

I think the reason he got a stiff sentence (midway between the 15-25 sentencing guideline) was that he got caught TWICE for the same crime. After getting caught the first time, he turned informant, even collecting a $75k salary from the Feds. Meanwhile, he went back to his fraudulent activities and started working an even bigger crime than the one he was originally busted for, and under the Feds noses at that... Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice and I'll throw the book at you.

Re:Explain Concurrent sentences Please

[eudas]

Hmm, some brief googling turns up a page which appears to offer a decent answer:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/71874/concurrent_vs_consecutive_sentences.html?cat=17

Re:TJX Case

[captaindomon]

TJX was not in compliance with PCI-DSS, even though they said they were. Thus the fines from Visa. PCI-DSS has issues of course, but if they followed it correctly they would not have suffered this intrusion.