13 years in prison cometh for the "Iceman" hacker

A San Francisco man charged with hacking into financial institutions and then hawking the stolen data in an online forum has been sentenced to 13 years in federal prison.

Max Ray Butler, who uses the online alias "Iceman," additionally was ordered to pay $27.5 million in restitution. He was sentenced Friday in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh.

The 37-year-old was indicted in 2007 on charges of wire fraud and transferring stolen identity information. Police tracked down Butler with the help of an informant from Pennsylvania who purchased more than 100 credit card records from him.

He pleaded guilty last June.

According to the complaint against Butler, he used wireless hijacking tactics to break into the databases of financial institutions and credit card processing centers from various hotel rooms.

Then, he sold the stolen information on his now defunct online forum, CardersMarket, reportedly peddling some 1.8 million records that resulted in some $86 million in fraudulent charges.

Butler was facing at least 30 years in prison but received a reduced sentence after cooperating with prosecutors. According to a report in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, his attorney argued that jailing Butler was a waste of resources and that he should use his expertise to help defend the nation against cyberterrorists.

Butler previously was released from jail in 2002 after serving an 18-month sentence for hacking into Pentagon computers, the report said. He only was sentenced after he stopped cooperating with federal authorities.