Angler employed advanced evasion techniques, including checking for virtual machines and sandbox environments to avoid detection by security researchers, leading to its popularity and significance in the cybersecurity community. Angler’s activities ceased abruptly in mid-2016, reportedly, due to law enforcement actions in Russia against cybercriminals allegedly linked to Angler.

First charged in 2023

The Belarusian and Ukrainian hacker was first indicted in the District of New Jersey in June 2023, for using malvertising and other means to deliver malware, scareware, and online scams to “millions of unsuspecting Internet users in the United States and elsewhere,” from October 2013 through March 2022.

The indictment, however, was unsealed only on August 12, 2024. The indictment against Kedariya also involved two other cybercriminals, Belarussian and Ukrainian dual-national Maksim Silnikau, and Russian national, Andrei Tarasov.