Wang allegedly ran nearly 150 dedicated servers around the world, 76 of which he leased from US service providers. “Using dedicated servers, Wang deployed and managed applications, commanded and controlled infected devices, operated his 911 S5 service, and gave paying customers access to IP addresses associated with infected devices,” the Department of Justice said in a press release. .
Authorities confirmed that Wang was financially motivated without any ties to the country. Charges include conspiracy to commit computer fraud, computer fraud, conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
Botnet is used for serious fraud
Many of the 911 S5 customers allegedly targeted multiple pandemic relief programs, according to court documents. They used IP addresses purchased from 911 S5 to hide their real locations.
One such case involved submitting 560,000 fraudulent insurance claims during the crisis, originating from vulnerable IP addresses. This resulted in confirmed fraud losses exceeding $5.9 billion, according to the release. Additionally, IP addresses are believed to have been used to make more than 47,000 Economic Injury Disaster Relief (EIDL) claims, amounting to millions of dollars in fraudulent losses.
“Law enforcement first focused on the 911 S5 during an investigation into a money laundering and smuggling scheme, where criminal actors in Ghana and the United States used stolen IP addresses purchased from the 911 S5 to place fraudulent orders using stolen Army and Air Force credit cards. Exchange Service (AAFES) for the online e-commerce platform known as ShopMyExchange,” authorities said in a release. “Although approximately 2,525 fraudulent orders with a value of $5.5 million were submitted, credit card fraud detection systems and federal investigators were able to intercept a large number of purchase attempts, reducing the actual loss to approximately $254,000.”
If convicted of all charges, Wang faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in prison. A lawyer could not immediately be identified for Wang, according to reports. The FBI uses a web page to help potential victims check if their device is vulnerable.
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