美国判处Gozi病毒制作者

Nearly a decade ago, computer security experts found a new kind of malicious software that would eventually infect more than 1 million computers in the United States and Europe and cause tens of millions of dollars in damages.

On Monday, a U.S. federal court sentenced Russian national Nikita Kuzmin on charges of conspiracy, bank fraud and computer intrusion for creating the software, named Gozi, and selling it to hackers who used it to steal money from bank accounts.

Prosecutors said Kuzmin "committed this crime purely out of greed" and helped pioneer a new kind of cybercrime that has become more prevalent in recent years.

Prosecutors said security experts identified 10,000 account records from more than 5,200 people, which included login information for accounts with hundreds of companies. The infected computers included hundreds at the U.S. space agency NASA.

Kuzmin said he did not partake in stealing bank account information himself. He made money by renting use of Gozi to others and by collecting a portion of whatever they later stole with it. According to court documents, Kuzmin estimated he made at least $250,000.

The court said Kuzmin's punishment is the 37 months he has already spent in prison, as well as paying $6.9 million that authorities have identified as the losses incurred by two banks in the U.S. and one in Europe.