Serial hacker suspected of stealing psychotherapy patient records extradited to Finland

A serial hacker suspected of stealing tens of thousands of psychotherapy patient records was extradited to Finland on Saturday (February 25), after he was arrested in France. Twenty-five-year-old Julius Kivimaki was arrested in Paris on February 3, on the run from a European arrest warrant issued by the Finnish Police in October last year, the news agency AFP reported. Last week, French authorities had given the green light for Kivimaki's extradition.

Kivimaki's lawyer Peter Jaari told AFP that the hacker was now being held in Vantaa prison near Helsinki. Meanwhile, Marko Leponen of the National Bureau of Investigation, who is heading the probe said the aim was to interview Kivimaki as soon as possible.

The probe is related to the 2018 and 2019 hacking of the Finnish company Vastaamo, which manages dozens of psychotherapy centres across Finland. AFP reported that in the cyberattack, confidential treatment records of psychotherapy patients in Finland were stolen and some leaked online.

Many patients reported receiving emails with a demand for $236 (200 euros) in bitcoin to prevent the contents of their discussions with therapists from being made public. The Finnish police estimated that there were over 30,000 victims whose data was leaked.

After the leak was made public in October 2020, the government announced a crisis meeting over the unprecedented data breach, as distressed psychotherapy patients flooded mental health charities.

Julius Kivimaki has already been convicted of various counts of cybercrime, fraud, and money laundering. He was a member of a cybercriminal group called the Lizard Squad.

According to a report by cybernews earlier this month, the Lizard Squad was most active in 2014 and was connected with DDoS attacks on PlayStation and Xbox online gaming services. The group was also connected with a bomb threat against an aircraft carrying then Sony Online Entertainment’s President John Smedley.

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