The Shadowcrew organisation and its associated website, Shadowcrew.com, was a hub of online identity theft activity, facilitating online trafficking in stolen identity information and documents, as well as over 1.5 million stolen credit and debit card numbers.
In all, the losses incurred as a result of the conspiracy amounted to over $4 million, said the Justice Department.
The operation was closed down in October 2004 after a year-long investigation by the Secret Service. Twenty-one were arrested in the US and other arrests were made abroad. To date, 12 people have pleaded guilty.
Six of these – Andrew Mantovani, 23, of Scottsdale, Arizona; Kim Taylor, 47, of Arcadia, California; Jeremy Stephens, 31, of Charlotte, North Carolina; Brandon Monchamp, 22, of Scottsdale, Arizona; Omar Dhanani, 22, of Fountain Valley, California; and Jeremy Zielinski, 22, of Longwood, Florida – pleaded guilty on Thursday.
Another man, Wesley Lanning, 22, of Grove City, Ohio, pleaded guilty to the conspiracy on Wednesday, following Rogerio Rodrigues 22, of Chicago, who pleaded guilty on 22nd September.
According to prosecutors, the “Shadowcrew” members face up to five years in prison and a maximum fine of $250,000 for conspiracy to commit credit and bank card fraud, as well as identification document fraud.
One member of the gang, Mantovani, also pleaded guilty to a second count of unlawful transfer of identification to facilitate criminal conduct; admitting his role in illegally obtaining approximately 18 million email accounts with associated personal identifying information.
He could be sentenced to a further five years and a fine of $250,000 for this offence.
During his guilty plea, Mantovani acknowledged his role as co-founder and administrator of the Shadowcrew website, said the Justice Department. As such, Mantovani had the power to control the direction of the organisation as well as the day-to-day management of the website.
He admitted using techniques such as phishing and spamming to illegally obtain credit and bank card information, which he then used to make purchases online.
“These individuals proved in a big way that the internet can be a dangerous place where consumers can be victimised without warning,” said US Attorney Christopher Christie. “But as this case also shows, criminals operating in the virtual world of the internet are not ultimately anonymous. Their crimes can be traced and documented, and they can be tracked down, arrested, prosecuted and sent to prison.”
Sentencing will take place in late February and early March.
