Man Formerly on FBI Most Wanted List Pleads Guilty in 'Scareware' Hack

The FBI's former fifth-most wanted cybercriminals has pleaded guilty to hacking-related charges in a scareware attack that targeted visitors to the Minneapolis Star Tribune website.

Latvian national Peteris Sahurovs, 28, - aka "Piotrek" and "Sagade" - faces a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud for his role in providing Web hosting services and technical support in 2010 to a so-called scareware scheme that infected users on the Star's website via a malicious online ad. The ad served up scareware and phony Windows Security Alerts, warning victims to purchase phony antivirus services to fix their infected computers, which either had slowed or failed altogether.

Sahurovs, who admitted to authorities that he ran a Web hosting service in Latvia that leased server capacity to cybercriminals spreading malware, fake antivirus, spam, and botnet operations, made between $150,000 and $250,000 off the scareware operation on the Minneapolis Star Tribune website.

Read more about his case before US federal authorities here.