Man accused of involvement in massive data breach appears in Kitchener court

The man accused of being behind a massive data breach impacting several large U.S. companies made a brief appearance in Kitchener court Friday.

Connor Moucka, 25, appeared via video from Maplehurst Correctional Centre.

He is facing an extradition request from the United States.

Moucka was arrested on Oct. 30, after investigators identified he was living at a home in the Stanley Park neighbourhood of Kitchener.

According to the Department of Justice Canada, Moucka first appeared in court that afternoon. At a subsequent court date in mid-November, he indicated he was awaiting a decision on legal aid.

During the brief appearance on Nov. 29, Moucka confirmed he had retained a lawyer for the extradition matter.

He's scheduled to return to court on Dec. 20.

A U.S. court indictment accuses Moucka and another person, John Erin Binns, of devising and executing international computer hacking and wire fraud schemes.

The details align with a breach earlier this year that involved customers of Snowflake, a cloud-based data storage company. Hackers accessed usernames, and in some cases passwords, through a third party company that manages data on Snowflake.

Companies that said they were impacted by the breach included AT&T, Live Nation and Advance Auto Parts.

The court documents identify some of the victims as a major telecommunications company in the U.S. that had about 50 billion customer call and text records stolen, and a major retailer, major entertainment company and major health care company that all had some of their customers’ data stolen.

It's alleged the hackers successfully extorted about $2.5 million from at least three companies who paid ransoms.