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A federal grand jury in Atlanta has indicted four alleged members of an international fraud ring on charges of hacking into RBS WorldPay Inc.'s computer network last November and fraudulently obtaining roughly $9 million from payroll debit card accounts, according to the indictment filed Nov. 10. RBS WorldPay disclosed in December that hackers had compromised the personal information of potentially 1.5 million prepaid cardholders and the Social Security numbers of 1.1 million individuals (CardLine, 12/29/08). Between Nov. 4 and Nov. 8, 2008, the indicted individuals allegedly hacked into the processor's system and accessed payroll debit card account numbers and personal identification numbers, according to the indictment. The defendants then raised the funds limits on the compromised accounts and provided a network of "cashers" with 44 counterfeit cards and PINs. Cashers are individuals who obtain funds for the hackers using the fraudulent cards. Of the 44 prepaid card numbers distributed to the cashers, 42 were tied to Palm Desert (Calif.) National Bank accounts, according to the indictment. The cashers used the cards to withdraw more than $9 million in less than 12 hours from more than 2,100 ATMs in at least 280 cities worldwide, authorities say. After the cashers completed the withdrawals, the hackers allegedly attempted to destroy data on RBS WorldPay's computer network to conceal their fraud, according to the indictment. "Last November, in just one day, an American credit card processor was hacked in perhaps the most sophisticated and organized computer fraud attack ever conducted," Sally Quillian Yates, acting U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, said in a release. "This investigation has broken the back of one of the most sophisticated computer hacking rings in the world." Atlanta-based RBS WorldPay is the U.S. payment-processing arm of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group. An RBS WorldPay representative did not return a request for comment by CardLine deadline.
