Czechs Arrest Russian Hacker Wanted By FBI (go.com)

Bookworm09 quotes a report from New York Times (paywalled, alternate source): A man identified as a Russian hacker suspected of pursuing targets in the United States has been arrested in the Czech Republic, the police announced Tuesday evening. The suspect was captured in a raid at a hotel in central Prague on Oct. 5, about 12 hours after the authorities heard that he was in the country, where he drove around in a luxury car with his girlfriend, according to the police. The man did not resist arrest, but he had medical problems and was briefly hospitalized, the police said in a statement. The FBI said in a statement that the man was "suspected of conducting criminal activities targeting U.S. interests. As cybercrime can originate anywhere in the world, international cooperation is crucial to successfully defeat cyber adversaries." ABC News reports: "Prague's Municipal Court will now have to decide on his extradition to the United States, with Justice Minister Robert Pelikan having the final say. Russian officials, however, are demanding that the suspect be handed over to them. Spokeswoman Marketa Puci said the court ruled on Oct. 12 that the man will remain in detention until the extradition hearing. No date has yet been set. U.S. authorities have two months to deliver to their Czech counterparts all of the documents necessary for the Czech authorities to decide on the extradition request."

Comments

Will the FBI prosecute politicians in the emails?

[StandardCell]

Obviously this validates the content of the e-mail as real, indicating multiple violations of federal and state laws by the senders, recipients and those discussed in the emails. Otherwise, there'd be no point in prosecuting this person, much less releasing this information on the day of the final presidential debate.

Americans, don't complain when you got arrested

[Anonymous Coward]

...overseas. Your country is demonstrating to other regimes that it is ok to abduct people in a 3rd country.

Re:Americans, don't complain when you got arrested

[gl4ss]

usa doesn't extradite american hackers so why would any country send anyone in for the same thing is beyond me.

oh and .. well. about abducting people. this is hardly the best example of it since it's going through authorities and usa has demonstrated the will and ability to do it even without authorization.

How Embarrasing

[rtb61]

Seriously guys, it looks really pathetic when the Czech police arrest some one and US law enforcers make the public statements. The only comment from Czech authorities, baa, baa, baa (Czech dudes watch out for the gum boots, http://www.urbandictionary.com...). The Czech police did the arresting, than they should make the public statements and the FBI should shut the fuck up, otherwise it looks really bad, like baa, baa, bad and right now thanks to the purposeful immigrant crisis Europeans are pretty pissed off with the US government and NATO and you do not want to be so diplomatically arrogant and clumsy.

Re:How Embarrasing

[Anonymous Coward]

How does international cooperation in law enforcement make anyone look bad?

Re: How Embarrasing

[phayes]

Oh yeah, Germany and Japan are quisling governments completely subservient to the U.S... when the press you read is russian.

Russians can't even conceive that The U.S. wants allies and does not want/need slave states the way Russia installs in areas like the occupied areas it has illegally annexed in Georgia / the Ukraine.

Thats why putinbots like the above AC flood the internet with their warped reality posts.

Re:How Embarrasing

[phayes]

Awww... Putin not happy that members of his private hacker army that he hides behind to hack everyone cannot continue to vacation in the countries that the USSR made into quisling regimes for so long. Poor, poor Putin...

Part of U.S. backlash for Russian state sponsored hacking appears to be denying their ability to vacation outside of Russia. Europeans like me are much more pissed of at Putin for his and the Assad regimes war crimes that created the emigration flux than they are at the U.S. for asking for the arrest of a russian hacker and then detailing why they asked for it.

Re: How Embarrasing

[dunkelfalke]

Look, I am German and I do think that our government kisses American arses. Many of our politicians, especially of our conservative party, have explicitly stated that they consider USA being the best friend of Germany, American interests being more important than concerns of German citizens and that anybody who thinks different just hates the US.

Re:How Embarrasing

[rtb61]

Diplomacy right over you head isn't it. The Czech authorities are the arresting officers, they are the ones in charge, the FBI is this regard are nobodies, zero authority, just witnesses providing information to the Czech authorities to act upon. It is entirely up to Czech authorities to make public statements ie they arrested someone based upon the evidence provided by foreign witnesses and that then extends out to a Czech legal process to finalise the extradition. You are obviously heavily into American exceptionlism and that is really quite distasteful in the rest of the world. If the evidence is there cool, one less criminal (ten less, thousands less, no matter the nationality, good work by the FBI as long as they can properly prove their case) to deal with on the internet but the Czech authorities are the ones in charge not US witnesses who should have made no public statements but have left that up to Czech authorities (otherwise it looks very much like they are forcing the Czech authorities hand and issuing orders to Czech courts). The way the FBI presented it, is they ordered the Czech authorities and they were required to shut up and obey and that looks really bad and can be made to look a whole lot worse. Your waffle added on top, just makes it look even worse for any Europeans reading it. Also it sounds very much like the did nothing in the interim with regard to communicating with the Russian authorities and that also looks really bad (better to make the request, have it ignored and then take action, rather than insult all Russian investigatory agencies because that will end all possibilities of cooperation, just stupidly arrogantly clumsy, as they can not now point the finger at Russian authorities and state they ignored the issue, needs to be done every time). I suppose all that will also go over your head. You can pretend all you want that Europeans are happy with the US it will not change anything and all other US government agencies carrying on as if American exceptionalism exists outside of America but it will only make things much worse (sure a whole bunch of corrupt European politicians are owned by multinational corporations but that does not reflect in the desires of majority Europeans). PS I am not fucking Russian, if you must know, as it seems to burn your brain I am Croatian Australian (neither have particular fond ties with Russian, not in the least but both can be quite up tight if their authority is not respected within their own country by other countries).

Re: How Embarrasing

[phayes]

Can you honestly describe your government as a quisling regime imprisoning anyone who dares to criticize it's masters like the original Quisling did for the Nazis, East Germany did for the USSR & the puppet governments are doing in russian occupied Georgia & the Ukraine?

Either your answer is no, and you accept my point that the U.S created allies (who can disagree, even violently) or you'll have to justify just when/where/how the USA has imposed the controls over Germany that you are implying.

Re:How Embarrasing

[phayes]

Diplomacy has a role in international law enforcement relations but it isn't what you are portraying nor over my head.

That the Czech authorities are the ones in control of the russian hacker until their justice system decides whether or not to extradite or release him is not in dispute, just your attempt at portraying an announcement by the FBI on why they asked for his arrest is a master regime giving orders to a slave regime or not.

You're mixing up diplomacy, law enforcement and emotions and quite visibly making a hash of the lot. I don't know what has worked you up to the point where you are doing so, but I suspect it is ether your not mastering the announcements made by the FBI in english (yes that comes across too) or some other sources that translated them for you and did a very poor job (possibly on purpose as it is the #1 Russians tactic).

Now step back and think: Is it really in the U.S.G's best interest or habit to be giving orders to foreign justice systems the way the USSR was in the habit of doing? Who is saying that they are doing so? Is another actor with an interest in portraying the USG as poorly as possible pulling strings? Is that same actor also in the habit of doing so, say like Russia has been doing ever since Putin came to power?

Re: How Embarrasing

[dunkelfalke]

Russian occupied Georgia and Ukraine? Seriously? By that logic Mexico is occupied by the USA because Americans have annexed Texas.

And yep, some critics have been indeed imprisoned
http://hrlc.org.au/preventive-...

Still, what you are doing is moving the goalposts. I have stated that many German government officials consider American interests more important than interests of German citizens and you try to switch the topic to imprisonment. And by the way, East Germany and USSR didn't imprison every critic. I know - I am originally from Rostock.

Re:How Embarrasing

[rtb61]

Watch this https://www.youtube.com/watch?.... What more needs to be said.

Re:How Embarrasing

[phayes]

So a fired Foxnews commentator is your ultimate reference? How sad for you.

Re: How Embarrasing

[phayes]

Another putinbot presenting their warped reality...

Hé ducon, je suis français et c'est la presse d'ici que je lis tous les jours.

Nothing to do with DNC

[imidan]

Because all of the posts so far are about the Clinton email/DNC hacks, and because the summary is obviously trying to cash in on current political events to make this a big story by excluding this, here is a quote FTFA:

Law enforcement officials in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment while the investigation was underway, said Wednesday that the suspect did not appear to be related to the hacking of the Democrats’ emails or to organizations like DCLeaks or WikiLeaks.

Re:Nothing to do with DNC

[AHuxley]

All the paragraphs in just to finally find a "social media company"

Re:Yeh it reveals their crimes

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes Vladimir, I hate those fucking shills too. They keep messing up our misdirection. My boss will not be happy.

Are we all meeting up for Borscht later?

Crazy

[freeze128]

When the Russian hacker was arrested, he donned a pair of goggles and said "Safety is number one priority."

Re:Crazy

[avandesande]

They should box him up and send him here by UPS, then we could say 'the Czech is in the mail'

Re:Will the FBI prosecute politicians in the email

[Anonymous Coward]

Reality check.

1) As noted at the end of the article, this guy is wanted for hacks that have nothing to do with government email.

2) Illegally obtained evidence can't be used in court.

For someone who endlessly philosophizes on Slashdot, you're ability to read accurately or construct an actual argument are shit.

Re: Yeh it reveals their crimes

[dunkelfalke]

Just to nitpick, if you actually say "borscht" to a Russian, they wouldn't understand you immediately. You see, that particular Cyrillic letter at sounds as "sht" only in Bulgarian. Ukrainians pronounce it as "shch", which would sort of work in Russian, as it is the same in some dialects. In Russian proper that letter sounds like a very soft (Russian is more or less the softest of all Slavic languages) sh, sort of like in the word "sheep", but still softer. Imagine the word "sheep" as said by a very camp gay, that "sh" would sound close.

Re:Trump the Russian spy

[Zontar The Mindless]

Not to mention all the little Trump-bots scuttling about parroting Kremlin foreign policy positions almost word-for-word...

Re:Will the FBI prosecute politicians in the email

[TheCastro1689]

Your second point is wrong, only if it is illegally obtained by the government.

Nothing to do with DNC hack

[XXongo]

Um, as far as I can tell this has nothing to do with the DNC hack.

Russian hackers do do other types of breaking into computers and black-hat hacking, you know-- malware, ransomware, zombiebots, credit-card skimming, identity theft, stealing email from people other than Podesta, spamming, DDOS for hire. They don't spend all their time hacking into the Clinton campaign.