A man from Stradishall, England, has been charged with breaching sensitive information for over 100,000 federal government employees.
The decision against 29-year-old Lauri Love was made on Thursday by a federal panel in the Eastern District of Virginia.
He breached the security of systems belonging to the U.S. Department of Energy, Health and Human Services, the U.S. Executive Committee, the FBI Regional Forensic Computer Laboratory, Deltek, Inc, and ForteInteractive, Inc.
In 2012, with the help of accomplices, Love exploited a security vulnerability in Adobe ColdFusion, which was known at the time, and managed to extract employee records containing their full names, social security numbers, addresses, phone numbers, as well as information about their salaries.
According to a statement from the FBI, the hacker also stole more than 100,000 financial details including credit card numbers and names.
It appears that the financial damage caused by Love amounted to over $5 million / €3.72.
Love and his colleagues used specially crafted administrative files after exploiting ColdFusion bugs, which allowed them to gain privileges on the compromised systems.
If convicted of the charges, the English hacker could face up to ten years in prison. However, it appears that Love faces separate indictments on related charges in New Jersey and the Southern District of New York.
