14 DAY TRIAL // Max Ray Vision, a notorious hacker arrested for stealing the details of millions of credit cards, was sentenced yesterday to 13 years in a federal prison. Mr. Vision's hacking sentence is the longest of its kind ever to be recorded in the United States.
Max Ray Vision, 37, of San Francisco, is better known by his previous name, Max Ray Butler, which he changed before being arrested in 2007. Vision is one of the few examples of security consultant/researchers who turned to the dark side and went on to play an active and important role in the cyber-criminal underground. Usually, it is hackers who give up their bad habits and go on to become security experts.
In 2001, Butler was jailed for 18 months after he installed a backdoor on thousands of government and military computers by exploiting a security vulnerability in BIND. It was during his time in prison that he befriended the crook who would ultimately introduce him to a life of crime.
The hacker ended up stealing credit card details from various institutions, which was then given to his accomplices or sold online. The information enabled the creation of fake cards, which were then used to buy goods.
Authorities started investigating Vision in 2006 after he successfully hijacked four major carding forums, including DarkMarket, which served as an FBI sting-operation. The hacker's intention was to unite the entire carding underground community under his own website, CardersMarket.
He was arrested in September 2007 and after decrypting data from his computer, the feds found the stolen details of over 1.8 million credit cards issued by hundreds of banks. The fraudulent charges on these cards were estimated at over $85 million, but these were racked up by other carders who bought the information from Vision.
The hacker was sentenced in a Pittsburgh court and faced life in prison, but the judge was lenient because he cooperated with the authorities. "I was quite impressed by the cooperation shown by Mr. Butler," U.S. District Judge Maurice Cohill Jr. commented according to Wired. He will also have to spend five years of probation after his release and pay $27.5 million in restitution.