The Miami man accused of masterminding the theft of more than 40 million credit card numbers from TJX Cos. of Framingham, BJ’s Wholesale Club of Natick, and other stores four years ago was charged yesterday with a new crime, said to be the largest data theft in US history.
Federal prosecutors yesterday charged Albert Gonzalez, 28, and two unnamed conspirators with breaking into the computer networks of several major financial institutions and retailers around the country and stealing data from more than 130 million credit and debit cards.
“The scope is massive,’’ said Assistant US Attorney Erez Liebermann in Newark, where Gonzalez was indicted. “This guy worked very, very hard at something he was very good at.’’
Gonzalez was charged with one count of wire fraud conspir acy and one count of conspiracy. The targets in this newest case include the New England supermarket chain Hannaford Brothers Co., the 7-Eleven Inc. chain, and Heartland Payment Systems, a New Jersey company that processes credit card payments for thousands of stores and businesses across the country.
Prosecutors said Gonzalez and others allegedly began plotting the crime in October 2006. They allegedly hacked into the companies’ computer systems, stole the credit card data, then stashed it on computers in California and Illinois, as well as in several foreign countries - among them Latvia, the Netherlands, and Ukraine - underscoring the international scope of the incidents. They also allegedly used sophisticated techniques to cover their tracks to avoid detection, authorities said.
Hannaford is based in Maine and has stores in Massachusetts and across the Northeast. The supermarket company reported last year that as many as 4.2 million credit and debit cards were potentially compromised, including many from Massachusetts. And the break-in at Heartland forced more than a dozen community banks in Massachusetts …
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