A Peekskill man has been arrested for allegedly running the dark web hacking forum known as “Breachforums.”
Conor Brian Fitzpatrick, who called himself a “pompompurin,” is indicted in Virginia federal court on one count of conspiracy to commit access device fraud, according to court documents.
Fitzpatrick, who is 20 or 21, was arrested this week at his home in Peekskill, court documents say.
The arrest was first reported by Bloomberg.
“When I arrested the defendant on March 15, 2023, he told me in substance and in part that: a) his name was Conor Brian FitzPatrick; b) used the alias “pompompurin” and c) was the owner and operator of “BreachForums,” the data breach website referenced in the complaint,” FBI Special Agent John Longmire said in Published court documents.
Going by the online name “pompompurin,” Fitzpatrick has reportedly been one of the biggest names in cyber leaks in recent years.
He was a high-profile member of the RaidForums site, which was seized by the FBI in 2022. The feds described RaidForums as “a popular marketplace for cybercriminals to buy and sell hacked data.”
Breachforums was a new site that Fitzpatrick supposedly created to fill the void created by the closure of RaidForums.
The feds say hackers used to use Breachformus to exfiltrate stolen data, and it is believed to have been the largest data breach forum of its kind, accused, among other things, of illegally hosting the illicitly obtained databases of more than 1,000 companies.
Last week, Breachforums was used to try to sell personal information belonging to US politicians, authorities said. The data had allegedly been stolen in a DC Health Link Hackingthe health care provider for members of the US House of Representatives and their families.
Fitzpatrick posted $300,000 bail and was released from jail Thursday. He is scheduled to appear in federal court in Virginia on March 24.