American authorities have Moldovan citizen Sandu Dyakon (also known by the nicknames utmsandu, sandushell, rootarhive, and WinD3str0y) to 42 months in prison for operating E-Root, a major darknet marketplace where access to hacked computers worldwide was sold.
According to , after serving his prison term, Dyakon, who was the administrator of E-Root from January 2015 to February 2020, will be under supervision for an additional 3 years.
Recall that Sandu Dyakon was arrested in the UK in 2021 while attempting to flee the country after authorities seized E-Root domains at the end of 2020. In the fall of 2023, he agreed to be extradited to the United States, where he and unnamed accomplices were charged with fraud using electronic means of communication, conspiracy, money laundering, computer fraud, and access device fraud.
E-Root was a marketplace that offered access to hacked computers worldwide in exchange for cryptocurrency. According to data obtained during the investigation, the platform sold access to over 350,000 compromised systems, including computers in various industries and at least one government system in Tampa, Florida.
“Based on evidence gathered during the investigation, authorities believe that more than 350,000 sets of credentials were listed for sale on the marketplace, the US Department of Justice reports. Victims were located worldwide and spanned across all industries. Many victims were subjected to extortion attacks, and some of the stolen credentials, posted on the marketplace, were linked to tax fraud schemes and identity theft.”
On E-Root, buyers had access to various filters and search tools, meaning that ad listings were organized by price range, region, provider, operating system, access via RDP or SSH, and so on.
Last fall, law enforcement noted that E-Root operated on a distributed network, providing the service with resilience and stealth, and had protective measures to conceal the real identities of sellers, buyers, and administrators. Moreover, the marketplace also operated a specialized cryptocurrency exchange service, allowing users to convert Bitcoin to Perfect Money and vice versa.
