Finland on Wednesday charged a hacker, accused of the theft of tens of hundreds of data from psychotherapy sufferers, with over 21,000 counts of extortion, the nationwide prosecutor introduced.
“The suspect is held on remand and has denied being responsible of the offenses,” the Nationwide Prosecution Authority mentioned in an announcement.
The prosecutor is searching for a seven-year jail sentence for the defendant, Aleksanteri Kivimaki, who was previously recognized as Julius Kivimaki.
Within the 2018 breach of the Finnish agency Vastaamo, which oversaw dozens of psychotherapy facilities all through the Nordic nation, the non-public remedy data of tens of hundreds of sufferers have been stolen.
After stealing the data, Kivimaki initially sought to extort over 360,000 euros ($381,000) in bitcoin Vastaamo in change for not leaking the data, based on the prosecutor.
When Vastaamo refused to pay, Kivimaki began leaking the data as a method of placing stress on the corporate.
In accordance with the prosecution, Kivimaki additionally despatched extortion letters to sufferers demanding sums starting from 200 to 500 euros to forestall the disclosure of data of their remedy periods.
Kivimaki was additionally charged with 9,598 counts of dissemination of knowledge infringing on private privateness.
Following a European arrest warrant issued by the Finnish police in October 2022, he was arrested within the Paris area on February 3.
Kivimaki has beforehand been convicted on varied expenses of cybercrime, fraud, and cash laundering, in addition to 50,700 data breaches carried out at the side of a hacker group in over 100 nations.
The trial is scheduled to start on November 13 and is predicted to final till February of subsequent yr.
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