A federal court in Detroit sentenced Russian national Illya Angelov, on Tuesday, for running a botnet operation that infected thousands of computers daily, sold backdoor access to ransomware groups and victimized 72 companies across 31 U.S. states.

The extortion scheme involving Angelov and his criminal organization, known by the FBI as "Mario Kart," ran from 2017 to 2021. Prosecutors said Angelov and co-conspirators built a network of compromised computers that distributed malware-infected files attached to spam emails.

Angelov and his co-manager then monetized this botnet by selling access to individual compromised computers to other criminal groups, who typically engaged in ransomware...