Law enforcement agencies in the United States have arrested and charged three men for allegedly stealing over 130 million credit and debit card numbers. The authorities believe that this is the largest hacking and identity theft case ever to be prosecuted.

One of the alleged fraudsters, Albert Gonzalez, who apparently was also a former government informant was actually already in a US jail in connection with other similar offences, along with Gonzalez two unnamed russians were charged on offences related to five corporate data breaches between 2006 to 2008. It is alleged that card numbers where stolen from credit card processor Heartland Payment Systems and retail chains 7-Eleven and Hannaford Brothers, two other as yet un-named corporations where also targeted in the sting.

Heartland Payment Systems and Hannaford Brothers had previously acknowledged that there had been a breach, however the size of the fraud had not been known at that time.

US Authorities stated that Gonzalez and the Russians, identified as "Hacker 1" and "Hacker 2", targeted large corporations by scanning the list of Fortune 500 companies and exploring corporate websites before setting out to identify vulnerabilities.
Prosecutors said the gang used numerous techniques to penetrate the computer systems. All three were charged with conspiracy to gain unauthorised access to computers, to commit fraud in connection with computers and to damage computers, and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Each faces up to 35 years in a federal prison with massive fines if convicted of the offences.

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