Source: Office of United States Attorneys
MINNEAPOLIS – A Michigan man has been indicted on wire fraud and aggravated identity theft charges after purchasing nearly 2,500 stolen login credentials from a malicious dark web marketplace and using them to make fraudulent financial transactions and offering some for sale on other internet sites, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Lisa D. Kirkpatrick.
According to court documents, from approximately February 2020 to November 2020, Andrew Shenkosky, 29, devised and executed a scheme while residing in Minnesota to defraud and obtain money through false pretenses. Shenkosky accomplished his scheme by purchasing and accessing stolen account information from the Genesis Market, an illicit online marketplace that was ultimately taken down by the FBI in or about April 2023. Genesis Market compiled hundreds of thousands of stolen login credentials, including cell phone numbers, email addresses, usernames, and passwords from malware-infected computers of victims across the world, and offered that stolen information for sale on the dark web.
According to court documents, Shenkosky purchased an invite code to Genesis Market using a cryptocurrency Coinbase account he fraudulently created in the name of one of his victims. In furtherance of his scheme, Shenkosky purchased 2,468 stolen credentials of various victims on Genesis Market. Shenkosky then used the stolen data to, among other things, make an unauthorized withdrawal from another victim’s bank account without their knowledge or authorization and transferred the funds to a PayPal account under his control. Shenkosky also offered and attempted to sell some of the victims’ stolen account data on a now-defunct cybercriminal forum named Raid Forums.
In January 2025, a grand jury returned an indictment charging Shenkosky with three counts of wire fraud, one count of aggravated identity theft, one count of possession of unauthorized access devices, and one count of trafficking computer access information. He made his initial appearance before Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Stafford in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan on February 11, 2025, and his arraignment hearing is scheduled in the District of Minnesota for February 25, 2025.
This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the FBI Cybercrime Unit and the FBI Minneapolis and Detroit Field Offices.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Benjamin Bejar and Robert Lewis are prosecuting the case.