Ukrainian lawyer's second career as a Conti coder earns him 4 years behind bars
Swapping legal work for malware development ended in extradition and a guilty plea
A Ukrainian lawyer who wound up coding malware for the Conti ransomware gang has been sentenced to four years in a US prison.
Oleksii Oleksiyovych Lytvynenko, 44, pleaded guilty in June to conspiracy to commit wire fraud over his role in Conti, the Russia-linked ransomware operation associated with more than 1,000 victims and at least $150 million in ransom payments.
Lytvynenko took an unusual route into the ransomware business. The Ukrainian national, who later lived in Cork, Ireland, trained as a lawyer before joining Conti as an intruder and developer.
According to his plea agreement[PDF], Lytvynenko operated under the handle "henry" and joined a team run by another Conti conspirator known as "silver" or "buza." He was recruited to help with coding and directed to work on a malware loader – software designed to get...
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