Category Archives: Treasury

Infrastructure Plan, Highway Grants Still Fleecing Americans

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Could the American taxpayer get fleeced again on the proposed Trump infrastructure proposal? History and facts says YES. Presently this is just chatter when it comes to improvements, there is no money allocated much less a plan. Draining that swamp is not underway either…

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With Billions in Recession-Era Highway Grants, Why Were Improvements Limited?

New research examines why nearly $28 billion of recession-era funding for highway projects didn’t yield greater improvements to the nation’s road network.

Bill Dupor, an assistant vice president and economist in the research division with the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, digs into the issue in the reserve bank’s latest quarterly Review.

Dupor looks at $27.5 billion funneled through the Federal Highway Administration as part of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Most of that amount was directed toward grants for state governments, marking a substantial boost in federal highway aid.

But in years before and after the Recovery Act, according to Dupor, the number of structurally deficient bridges in the U.S. was close to unchanged, as was the number of workers on road and bridge projects. And, he says, over 40 percent of the nation’s population lived in states where the overall value of highway construction spending was lower in 2010 than in 2008.

“Despite the tremendous influx of federal funds, the highway system showed little improvement,” Dupor writes.

Why was this the case? An explanation Dupor offers is that as states received the federal grant funding for road projects, they could decrease their own spending on highway infrastructure—freeing up those state dollars for other uses.

“Since states were facing budget stress from declining tax revenues resulting from the recession, it stands to reason that states had the incentive to do so,” Dupor writes, referring to the shifting of state highway funding to other areas.

He found that 15 states cut their total highway capital spending between 2008 and 2010. For instance, across that timeframe, the amount of state money spent per resident on highway infrastructure went down by $109 in Georgia, $98 in Texas and $73 in Maryland.

President Trump is currently pushing for a $1 trillion infrastructure package that would involve both public and private capital. Some city leaders have argued that, if the federal government ups infrastructure spending, more money should go directly to cities rather than through states.

Dupor’s article is titled, “So, Why Didn’t the 2009 Recovery Act Improve the Nation’s Highways and Bridges?” A full copy can be found here.

*** Obama’s shovel ready jobs….remember that?

Forbes: Those with long memories will recall that the way out of the economic difficulties back a few years was to be that we had a fiscal stimulus. The US was going to borrow a whole bunch of money and invest it in those shovel ready infrastructure projects that simply littered the country side. This would pull us up out of recession pretty darn sharpish and all would be well.

No, really, this was what was going to happen:

As President Obama urges Congress to pass the $800 billion-plus stimulus package, one of his favorite selling points is the thousands of projects nationwide that he calls “shovel ready” — meaning planning is complete, approvals are secured and people could be put to work right away once funding is in place.

There is no formal definition for shovel ready. The Federal Highway Administration says it doesn’t use the phrase. Its preferred term is “ready to go,” according to acting administrator Jeff Paniati.

That means a state has already done the preliminary work for that project, he says.

“They’ve addressed all the environmental requirements as required,” Paniati says. “They’ve done the necessary public outreach. In many cases, the design work is already completed … and that they’re on an approved state list.”

One example of a shovel-ready project is the in the notoriously traffic-clogged suburbs of Northern Virginia outside Washington, D.C. The state wants to widen the roads and has done some of the preliminary work, but the project is on hold because Virginia doesn’t have the final $32 million needed to complete it.

The stimulus bill states that for a project to be considered shovel-ready, it must be ready to begin in 90 days. The has a list of almost 19,000 such projects, adding up to almost $150 billion.

I quote at such length as this really was  what was touted as the way out of the then current problems.

FT Alphaville has a nice little chart today showing what actually happened:

Err, yes. The government gears up to massively boost infrastructure spending, borrows $800 billion to go do infrastructure spending and infrastructure spending falls through the floor at the same time.

My conclusion would be rather simple: government’s just not the way to get the job done.

I agree, there are some things that must be done. There are also things that must be done that only government can do: so, let government limit itself to only those things that must be done and can only be done by government. I think we’d be better off working out the rest of it by ourselves quite frankly.

I mean seriously? They insist that they’re going to boost the economy through infrastructure spending and even when they get the money infrastructure spending falls by by a third or more?

Jeff Sessions/FBI and MS-13

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Four members of the violent, foreign MS-13 gang were convicted on federal racketeering charges, some of which involved murder.

Miguel Zelaya, 20-years-old, Luis Ordonez-Vega, 36-years-old, Jorge Sosa, 24-years-old and William Gavidia, 23-years-old, were all convicted on a count of conspiracy to commit racketeering, according to the Charlotte Observer:

Zelaya, who also goes by “Most Wanted” and “Ne Ne” is a member of MS-13’s “Coronados Little Cycos Salvatrucha” clique. On Dec. 18, 2013, he shot and killed Jose Orlando Ibarra, an associate of The Latin Kings, a rival gang, the release said.

Ordonez-Vega, also known as “Big Boy,” is a member of the Brentwood Locos Salvatrucha” clique, according to the news release. On June 6, 2013, Ordonez-Vega shot and killed Noel Navarro Hernandez in a strip mall parking lot in Charlotte, believing the victim was a member of a rival gang.

Sosa, who goes by “Koki” and “Loco” is a member of the “Charlotte Locotes Salvatrucha” clique. Prosecutors say he’s been involved in multiple gang-related crimes. In Feb. 2008, he flashed MS-13 gang signs at a rival gang member’s mother and pointed a gun at her while they were stopped in traffic. In June, 2013, he was involved in a gang-related shooting where he and another person followed victims in a neighborhood in Charlotte and opened fire with a high-caliber rifle, the release said.

All of the gang members are either immigrants or the children of immigrants in the U.S. and they are also facing state charges for their crimes.

“Today’s guilty verdicts underscore that even though gang membership may in some ways ‘protect’ gangsters from outsiders, it certainly won’t protect them from the vast reach of the US. Attorney’s Office and our law enforcement partners,” U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina Jill Westmoreland Rose said in a statement.

The MS-13 gang members were four of 37 who were charged with racketeering after an investigation into the criminal activity by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force. Thirty of the other gang members charged with racketeering are either awaiting sentencing or have pleaded guilty to the charges.

According to the U.S. District Attorney, Ordonez-Vega and Zelaya were convicted on charges to murder in aid of racketeering. Those charges are connected to two separate murders. Meanwhile, Sosa was convicted for attempted murder in the aid of racketeering.

***

Image result for ms-13  InSightCrime

In 2015 the U.S. Treasury Department froze the assets of three members of the gang who were funneling funds back to higher-ups in El Salvador from prison. These actions were an attempt “disrupt” MS-13’s financial network by cutting off profits from illegal activities in the United States, the Treasury Department said. In 2012 the Obama administration designated MS-13 a transnational crime organization and implemented sanctions against six members in 2013.

While the U.S. government attempts to target MS-13’s earnings, targeting its culture is proving more difficult. The fierce loyalty among members is unique, Ron Hosko, former assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division, told FOX Business.

“They’re very cohesive and often directed by imprisoned bosses in El Salvador to recruit and expand in American communities. That tends to mean there’s an aggressive internal enforcement mechanism which equates to internal discipline involving physical violence and murder for disrespect or betrayal,” he said.

The FBI in El Salvador Because of MS-13:

CNN Reported Dossier Basis for Trump Surveillance, But…

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The FBI last year used a dossier of allegations of Russian ties to Donald Trump’s campaign as part of the justification to win approval to secretly monitor a Trump associate, according to US officials briefed on the investigation.

The dossier has also been cited by FBI Director James Comey in some of his briefings to members of Congress in recent weeks, as one of the sources of information the bureau has used to bolster its investigation, according to US officials briefed on the probe.
This includes approval from the secret court that oversees the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to monitor the communications of Carter Page, two of the officials said. Last year, Page was identified by the Trump campaign as an adviser on national security. More here from CNN.
Okay, so everyone remains angry with James Comey right? Okay, well hold on….this could get complicated. We cant dismiss the notion that Obama and Susan Rice had a valid reason for their surveillance
actions, at least some as the below case was provided to the White House.
Enter Evigeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev.
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U.S. v Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev et al by Brian Ries on Scribd

Bogachev was a case from 2014 investigated by CrowdStrike and then later offered help to the FBI office in Omaha and later the FBI office in Pittsburgh finally after countless months, ran a global cyber operation and succeeded in stopping international bank thefts in the millions of dollars. Many Russian immigrants located in Brighton Beach were recruited to be mules going to domestic banks, opening accounts and later withdrawing funds, cleaning all traces of the stolen millions. It should be noted that CrowdStrike was the same firm the Hillary campaign hired to investigate intrusions.

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Now it gets even more interesting.

The matter of Bogachev with his named operation of ‘Business Club’ and his global cyber operatives hacking with sophisticated bots, malware and remote servers came to the attention of the Russian Federation. They liked what the Bogachev Zeus operation had the ability to do. So, top Kremlin officials allowed the operation to continue without prosecution if they would work to gather intelligence on the global reaction to Putin annexing Crimea and moving in on Ukraine.

All of this came to the attention also of U.S. based private cyber professional where they studied the code, the IP addresses, the servers, the patterns, names and other common cyber traits. The DNC hack attributions are a dovetail to the ‘Business Club’ operation due to style, coding, networks, language and server locations.

In 2015, the Obama State Department issued sanctions and a $3 million dollar bounty on Bogachev who operated with the alias of ‘Slavik’. Russia of course is not only not cooperating but refuses to admit any such action was real and the evidence is not vetted. This is a usual response by top Russian officials.

An estimated $100 million was stolen via cyber operations by Slavik and computers infected with various versions of Zeus still exist while the FBI was able to seized all those known to their sting operation.

The FBI described the cyber sting operation as hand to hand combat with Bogachev and his operation on the Zeus case was deemed successful. It is unknown at this time who and where is he still operating. The summary of this operation was taken from the full article published by ‘Wired’ under the title ‘The Hunt for Russia’s Most Notorious Hacker’

Late last year, the DHS released a joint statement which read in part:

This activity by Russian intelligence services is part of a decade-long campaign of cyber-enabled operations directed at the U.S. Government and its citizens. These cyber operations have included spearphishing, campaigns targeting government organizations, critical infrastructure, think tanks, universities, political organizations, and corporations; theft of information from these organizations; and the recent public release of some of this stolen information.  In other countries, Russian intelligence services have also undertaken damaging and disruptive cyber-attacks, including on critical infrastructure, in some cases masquerading as third parties or hiding behind false online personas designed to cause victim to misattribute the source of the attack.  The Joint Analysis Report provides technical indicators related to many of these operations, recommended mitigations and information on how to report such incidents to the U.S. Government.

A great deal of analysis and forensic information related to Russian government activity has been published by a wide range of security companies.  The U.S. Government can confirm that the Russian government, including Russia’s civilian and military intelligence services, conducted many of the activities generally described by a number of these security companies.  The Joint Analysis Report recognizes the excellent work undertaken by security companies and private sector network owners and operators, and provides new indicators of compromise and malicious infrastructure identified during the course of investigations and incident response.  The U.S. Government seeks to arm network defenders with the tools they need to identify,, detect and disrupt Russian malicious cyber activity that is targeting our country’s and our allies’ networks.

 

Answer to Those Missile Failures of N. Korea

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The author of this site has mentioned for several months the reason for the recent failed missile launches of North Korea. There are two distinct causes and both point to the United States. They are cyber operations and electronic warfare.

Over the past decade of conflict, the U.S. Army has deployed the most capable communications systems in its history. U.S. forces dominated cyberspace and the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS) in Afghanistan and Iraq against enemies and adversaries lacking the technical capabilities to challenge our superiority in cyberspace. However, regional peers have since demonstrated impressive capabilities in a hybrid operational environment that threaten the Army’s dominance in cyberspace and the EMS.

The Department of Defense information network-Army (DODIN-A) is an essential warfighting platform foundational to the success of all unified land operations. Effectively operating, securing, and defending this network and associated data is essential to the success of commanders at all echelons. We must anticipate that future enemies and adversaries will persistently attempt to infiltrate, exploit, and degrade access to our networks and data. A commander who loses the ability to access mission command systems, or whose operational data is compromised, risks the loss of lives and critical resources, or mission failure. In the future, as adversary and enemy capabilities grow, our ability to dominate cyberspace and the EMS will become more complex and critical to mission success.

Incorporating cyberspace electromagnetic activities (CEMA) throughout all phases of an operation is key to obtaining and maintaining freedom of maneuver in cyberspace and the EMS while denying the same to enemies and adversaries. CEMA synchronizes capabilities across domains and warfighting functions and maximizes complementary effects in and through cyberspace and the EMS. Intelligence, signal, information operations (IO), cyberspace, space, and fires operations are critical to planning, synchronizing, and executing cyberspace and electronic warfare (EW) operations. CEMA optimizes cyberspace and EW effects when integrated throughout Army operations. More here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can be assured there is acute cooperation between the military and other Federal agencies including the CIA and NSA when it comes to North Korea. What do we know that media is not sharing?

North Korea’s proliferation of missile technology and expertise is another serious concern for the United States. Pyongyang has sold missile parts and/or technology to several countries, including Egypt, Iran, Libya, Burma, Pakistan, Syria, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.53 Sales of missiles and telemetric information from missile tests have been a key source of hard currency for the Kim regime.

North Korea and Iran have cooperated on the technical aspects of missile development since the 1980s, exchanging information and components.54 Reportedly, scientific advisors from Iran’s ballistic missile research centers were seen in North Korea leading up to the December 2012 launch and may have been a factor in its success.55 There are also signs that China may be assisting the North Korean missile program, whether directly or through tacit approval of trade in sensitive materials. Heavy transport vehicles from Chinese entities were apparently sold to North Korea and used to showcase missiles in a military parade in April 2012, prompting a U.N. investigation of sanctions violations.56  More here.

Security experts and U.S. officials have voiced increasing concern about North Korea’s improving cyberattack capabilities. In March 2013, an attack on the computer systems of several South Korean media and financial institutions disrupted their functioning for days, in one of the most significant cyberattacks in the country’s history; cybersecurity analysts identified North Korean hackers as the culprit.68 The FBI determined that North Korean hackers were responsible for the November 2014 cyberattack on Sony Pictures Entertainment, an intrusion that disrupted the company’s communication systems, released employees’ personal information, and leaked yet-to-be released films. (Some reports speculate that the cyberattack on Sony Pictures could have been an attempt to punish the company for its production of a comedy in which American journalists assassinate Kim Jong-un at the instigation of the Central Intelligence Agency.) Perhaps in response to doubts about the attribution of the cyberattack to North Korea, U.S. officials revealed that the National Security Agency had penetrated North Korean computer networks years in advance of the Sony hacking.69

*** Much has been printed in recent months, the WikiLeaks release of the CIA/NSA toolkit that demonstrates abilities of both agencies ability to intrude and intercept adversaries and allies in the cyber realm. Due to private citizens fear of unauthorized and possible access to personal data and internet activities, many Americans are angry. That anger is not misplaced, however, consider, do we want our agencies to have cyber skills to penetrate such rogue regimes as North Korea, Syria, Iran or militant factions such as al Qaeda and Islamic State? The answer is likely yes.

The UK Sunday Times reports: ”

A missile test by North Korea that failed seconds after launch may have been sabotaged by a US cyber-attack, a former foreign secretary has said.

The US said a ballistic missile “blew up immediately” after firing near the port of Sinpo on the east coast early today.

“It could have failed because the system is not competent enough to make it work, but there is a very strong belief that the US through cyber methods has been successful on several occasions in interrupting these sorts of tests and making them fail,” Sir Malcolm Rifkind, the former foreign and defence secretary, told the BBC.”.

*** The UK Telegraph tells us in part: U.S. Pacific Command detected and tracked what it assessed to be a North Korean ballistic missile launch at 11:21 a.m. Hawaii time (2121 GMT) on Saturday, said U.S. Navy Commander Dave Benham, a spokesman for  Pacific Command.

“The missile blew up almost immediately. The type of missile is still being assessed,” he said.

It was launched  from a base at Sinpo, a port city on the North Korean east coast. The North’s previous attempted missile launch, on April 5, also suffered an in-flight failure before the weapon crashed into the Sea of Japan. Experts have suggested that the United States may be carrying out “left-of-launch” attacks on the missiles using electromagnetic propagation or cyber attacks, including through infected electronics aboard the weapon that confuse its command and control or targeting systems. More here.

*** So, while we tend to panic and push back on the cyber toolkit of Federal agencies which WikiLeaks tells us to do, perhaps we should look wider and deeper to the positive affects of those operations as Japan and S. Korea are most at risk if North Korea is remotely successful. Can and do Federal agencies exploit cyber tools and electronic warfare against American citizens and is there evidence of abuse? Not so much yet, but this site does invite readers to offer evidence.

*** Some other items of interest with regard to North Korea:

  1. Chinese troops are always stationed in the northeast near North Korea, and Yun Sun, a senior associate with the East Asia Program at the Stimson Center, told Business Insider that “Chinese troop movements happen often along that border” when North Korean nuclear and missile provocations seem imminent.

    “When North Korea acts up with some sort of provocation, the Chinese in the past have moved their troops to reinforce their deployments in the northeast for military preparedness,” Yun said.

    “On the other hand,” Yun said, “I think it does signal that the Chinese are concerned about a potential escalation, or even potential conflict” between the US and North Korea, as North Korea plans a nuclear test and the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier pulls up to Korea’s coast.

  2. North Korea forces citizens to work outside the country in often slave labor conditions and the regime keeps 85% of the revenue. “150,000 N.Koreans Sent to Slave Labor Abroad,” Chosun Ilbo, November 13, 2014.  This often amounts to $1 billion a year in revenue.
  3. North Korea selling arms to Hamas and advises on tunnel systems.
  4. North Korea has a sizeable inventory and robust program in both chemical and biological weapons. While the DPRK possesses considerable capabilities to deliver CW agents, it is unclear whether comparable munitions are available to deliver BW agents. Although the DPRK has advanced missile technology, the fragile nature of biological agents complicates the task of using missiles as a means of delivery and dispersal. While the ROK government has estimated that half of the DPRK’s long-range missiles and 30 percent of its artillery pieces are capable of delivering chemical or biological warheads, it is not known whether biological payloads would survive and be effectively dispersed by these missiles. More here.

 

 

 

FBI Global Hackers Sweeping Sting Arrests

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So many complain the FBI is slow-walking cyber and hacking operations especially when it comes to the Russian investigations. Well, the FBI rarely announces cases and prosecutions. When it comes to the recent Russian hacking scandal into the United States election and campaign infrastructure, perhaps the Department of Justice and the FBI are building a huge file for proof.

So, try this:

NBC/McClatchy

 

U.S. sweeping up Russian hackers in a broad global dragnet

BY TIM JOHNSON/WASHINGTON

McClatchy: The arrests caught the Russian hackers totally by surprise. One was at a Finnish border crossing. Another was arriving at an airport in Spain. A third was dining at a restaurant in Prague. Still others were at luxury resorts in the Maldives and Thailand.

Many have now turned up in U.S. courts. The long arm of U.S. law enforcement is spanning the globe like never before to bring criminal hackers to justice.

And it may not be just about crime. The Justice Department cites fuzzy and overlapping boundaries between criminal hackers and Russian intelligence agencies, the same ones the U.S. accuses of coordinating the hacking and subsequent disclosure of emails from the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign.

President Donald Trump dismisses allegations that Russia meddled in the election as “fake news,” but the FBI and congressional committees have launched probes and the Obama administration ordered the expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats in late December.

Rubio says Russian hackers targeted his presidential campaign

During a Senate committee hearing on Thursday, Florida Senator Marco Rubio stated that his 2016 presidential campaign staff members were the targets of Russian hackers in July 2016 and March 2017, but both efforts were unsuccessful.

The U.S. campaign leaves Russian hackers with a dilemma: If they leave the safe confines of Russia, which has no extradition treaty with the United States, or Russia’s most ardent allies, they may get picked up and sent to the U.S.

“They no longer travel, the high-profile hackers. They understand the danger,” said Arkady Bukh, a criminal defense lawyer in New York City who has defended numerous accused Russian cybercriminals.

Still, some Russian and Eastern European hackers do enjoy holidays abroad – and live to regret it. Just this week, Maxim Senakh, a 41-year-old Russian, pleaded guilty in a Minneapolis courtroom to operating a massive robotic network that generated tens of millions of spam emails a day in a zombie criminal enterprise that purportedly brought in millions in profits.

Senakh didn’t come voluntarily. He’d been visiting a sister in Finland before that country put him on a U.S.-bound plane in January, answering a U.S. extradition request.

“He fought it, the Russian government fought it, and the Russian government put political pressure on its neighbor, Finland,” federal prosecutor Kevin S. Ueland said at a Feb. 19 hearing.

Another Russian, Mark Vartanyan, 29, pleaded guilty March 20 to computer fraud in an Atlanta courtroom after reaching a deal with prosecutors to offer far-reaching cooperation that would limit a prison term to five years or less.

Norway extradited Vartanyan to the U.S. in December.

David Hickton, a former U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh who made the city a hub for prosecutions of foreign hackers, said such actions are a sign of the new dimensions of crime.

IT’S NO DIFFERENT THAN IF SOMEONE PULLED A TRUCK UP TO YOUR HOUSE AND STOLE VALUABLE MATERIAL. David Hickton, former federal prosecutor

“This is 21st century burglary. It’s no different than if someone pulled a truck up to your house and stole valuable material,” said Hickton, who now directs the Institute for Cyber Law, Policy and Security at the University of Pittsburgh.

But Hickton acknowledged that carrying off successful prosecutions is a challenge.

“These cyber investigations are very, very hard. You’re talking about evaporating evidence, borderless crimes and defendants who can hide behind the borders of countries that don’t have extradition treaties with us,” he said.

It is not easy to pigeonhole the accused and convicted hackers. Some are brainy but merely cogs in larger crime groups. Others flash their wealth and opulent lifestyles.

NOT ALL OF THEM ARE RICH. 

Arkady Bukh, criminal defense attorney in New York City

“Not all of them are rich,” Bukh said. “A lot of them are involved in computer intrusion and that does not bring much money.”

Bukh recalled one client, Aleksandr Panin, who was placed by authorities on a plane in the Dominican Republic to 2013 bound for Atlanta, put on trial and convicted.

“The guy couldn’t afford a car even with (having caused) a billion dollars in losses. He’s like a mad scientist geek,” Bukh said.

Then there are those on the opposite extreme, who pose for photos with piles of cash or at luxury beach resorts. One of them, Roman Seleznev, was convicted last year in Seattle on 38 counts related to cybercrime. His father is a deputy in the Russian parliament, or Duma. Prosecutors retrieved a photo from his cell phone of him standing next to a yellow Dodge Challenger muscle car in Red Square near the Kremlin.

The magnitude of damages that prosecutors have alleged can be mind-boggling.

Vartanyan, the young Russian hacker brought to Atlanta from Norway, was part of the development team that created Citadel, a “universal spyware system” sold on underground Russian criminal hacker forums that ended up lodged on 11 million infected computers around the world.

In their complaint against him, prosecutors cited industry estimates that Citadel caused “over $500 million in losses” in a three-year period.

The investigations can be incredibly complex, leading federal investigators to call in specialized cybersecurity firms to conduct forensics. In the probe of Senakh, whose guilty plea came last month, the feds turned to ESET, a cybersecurity firm with 18 offices around the world.

ESET analyzed the malicious code Senakh used, dubbed Ebury malware, and found that it had compromised 25,000 servers around the world, researcher Marc-Etienne Leveille said in an email.

Stanislav Lisov, a computer programmer from Taganrog, a town on Russia’s Black Sea coast, had arrived at Barcelona’s international airport with his wife on Jan. 13 when Spanish Civil Guard police arrested him on an FBI warrant issued through Interpol. The charges: electronic and computer fraud.

WE WERE DETAINED AT THE AIRPORT IN BARCELONA. 

Darya Lisova, wife of accused Russian hacker Stanislav Lisov

“We were detained at the airport in Barcelona, when we came to return a rented car before flying out to Lyon, to continue our trip and visit friends. When we were getting out of the car, two police officers approached, showed us the badge, and said they were detaining my husband,” Darya Lisova told the Russian state-operated RT network.

Spain has not yet extradited Lisov, who is blamed for being the architect of a sophisticated Trojan, NeverQuest, used in stealing log-in credentials for bank accounts.

Here is a rundown of some other recent cases:

Yevgeniy Nikulin, 29, was arrested by police while dining with his girlfriend in a hotel restaurant in Prague’s Old Town Oct. 5. He has been indicted by a federal grand jury in northern California on charges of computer intrusion, identity theft and other crimes for penetrating into the systems of high-tech companies LinkedIn, Dropbox and Formspring. Since then, Washington and Moscow have been in a tug-of-war over Nikulin’s extradition.

Olga Komova, a 26-year-old Uzbek, and Dmitry Ukrainsky, a Russian, were arrested in mid-2016 at beach resorts in Thailand and accused of stealing more than $28 million as part of a mega cyber bank fraud ring. Komova has turned up in U.S. custody and faces federal charges of wire fraud and money laundering. How she was brought to the United States is unclear. Her U.S. lawyer, Michael Soroka, declined to discuss the case.

When extradition isn’t an option, U.S. authorities lure alleged hackers to jurisdictions where they can be arrested. Such tactics have been decried by Moscow as “kidnapping.”

Seleznev, the identity thief who is the son of the Duma deputy, chose to vacation at a five-star resort in the Indian Ocean archipelago nation of the Maldives in 2014 precisely because it has no extradition treaty with the United States.

U.S. officials got word and persuaded Maldives authorities to intercept Seleznev at the airport, where in a fast-paced operation he was bundled on a private plane to Guam, a U.S. territory in the western Pacific, then flown to Seattle to face federal charges.

Upon his conviction last August, prosecutors said Seleznev had stolen millions of credit card numbers, causing 3,700 banks $169 million in losses. He faces a 40-year jail term.

No matter where the hackers travel, prosecutors say they will follow.

The U.S. attorney in Atlanta, John Horn, who has also made a name for himself in prosecuting Russian hackers, offered an unapologetic defense last year of the global reach of U.S. justice.

“Cybercrime is borderless, but increasingly, so too are our law enforcement capabilities,” Horn said.