http://www.nandotimes.com/noframes/story/0,2107,500184654-500245760-501233311-0,00.html

By MICHAEL J. SNIFFEN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (March 24, 2000 3:33 p.m. EST http://www.nandotimes.com) - Two 18-year-old boys were arrested in Wales and charged with breaking into retail Web sites in five countries and stealing information on 26,000 credit card accounts, the FBI said Friday.

The two, whose names were withheld under British law, were arrested at home Thursday by the Dyfed-Powys Police Service, FBI spokeswoman Debbie Weierman said.

The intrusions, conducted under the screen name, "Curador," could result in losses of more than $3,000,000, the FBI estimated.

The pair of boys were arrested in connection with intrusions into nine e-commerce Web sites in the United States, Canada, Thailand, Japan and the United Kingdom, the FBI said.

They are alleged to have stolen credit card information from more than 26,000 accounts and disclosed that information on the Internet, the FBI said.

Weierman declined to identify the e-commerce sites that were victimized or to say in which countries the affected credit card holders lived.

The case was investigated by the FBI, the Dyfed-Powys Police Service, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Internet security consultants.

The international banking and credit card industry also provided substantial cooperation, the FBI said.

Weierman declined to say how authorities first learned of the hacking or how long it went on.

-- viewer (justp@ssing.by), March 24, 2000

Answers

Teenagers have lots of free time. I remember being one... and causing lots of trouble...

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), March 24, 2000.