( CNN ) -- Four Russian nationals and a Ukrainian have been charged with running a massive scheme to steal info from more than 160 million credit and debit cards at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars . Each of the five men indicted had different roles in what the Department of Justice described Thursday in a news release as `` the largest such scheme ever prosecuted in the United States . '' According to that U.S. agency , one of the accused hosted `` bullet-proof '' web-hosting services , two of the defendants hacked corporate networks , one mined and stole sensitive data and the fifth sold that information to `` identity theft wholesalers . '' Two of the men were arrested at the request of U.S. authorities in June 2012 in the Netherlands . One of them , Dmitriy Smilianets , was extradited months later to the United States . He 'll appear in a federal court in New Jersey on the new charges of hacking conspiracy , conspiracy to commit wire fraud , unauthorized computer access and wire fraud , according to the Department of Justice . The three other indicted men were still at large Thursday . They are all accused of having targeted more than a dozen major American and international companies between 2005 and 2012 , including JCPenney , Carrefour , 7-Eleven , Nasdaq , JetBlue , Dow Jones and Ingenicard . More than 130 million card numbers were stolen from one company alone -- Heartland , a U.S.-based credit and debit card processing company -- resulting in about $ 200 million in losses , according to the U.S. federal court indictment unsealed Thursday . in a federal court in New Jersey . `` Those who have the expertise and the inclination to break into our computer networks threaten our economic well-being , our privacy , and our national security , '' said U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman , whose jurisdiction is New Jersey . `` And this case shows , there is a real practical cost because these types of frauds increase the cost of doing business for every American consumer , every day . '' Working with co-conspirators -- at least one of whom , Albert Gonzalez of Miami , is now serving a 20-year prison sentence related to several data breaches , according to the news release -- they 'd `` probe potential vulnerabilities '' in their targets ' websites and , in some cases , would even visit their retail stores , the indictment states . Then they would strike against retailers and other corporations engaged in financial transactions or the transmission of financial data . The defendants used computers in at least seven countries , including the United States , and anonymous web-hosting services allegedly provided by one of those charged , Mikhail Rytikov , to help hide their identities . Two of the defendants -- Alexandr Kalinin and Vladimir Drinkman , the latter of whom was arrested last year in the Netherlands -- would allegedly hack into networks and install malicious code , or malware , to make these systems more vulnerable . In some instances , this malware might be in place for more than a year . Once in , another of the accused -- Roman Kotov -- allegedly would capture loads of data such as user names and passwords , other identifying info and credit and debit card numbers . This information would then be sold by Smilianets at a price that varied , depending on its origin , U.S. authorities claim in the indictment . A single U.S. credit card number , for instance , would go for $ 10 , a Canadian one for $ 15 and a European number for $ 50 , according to the indictment . Bulk and repeat `` customers '' shopping for this illicit info got discounted prices . This data would then be encrypted on blank cards , which could be used to withdraw cash from ATMs or make purchases . Also Thursday -- in addition to the charges outlined in the indictment -- the U.S. Attorney 's Office for the Southern District of New York announced two additional indictments against Kalinin for hacking servers used by the financial securities market Nasdaq . A separate indictment accuses Kalinin and another Russian , Nikolay Nasenkov , of engineering a scheme to hack U.S.-based financial institutions , steal account information and withdraw millions of dollars from victims ' bank accounts . `` As today 's allegations make clear , cyber criminals are determined to prey not only on individual bank accounts , but on the financial system itself , '' Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said . The various hacking charges come on the same day that Stanford University experienced what it called `` an apparent breach of its information technology infrastructure similar to incidents reported in recent months by a range of companies and large organizations in the United States . '' In a message linked from its official Twitter feed , Stanford said it was still looking into the origin and the impact of the apparent breach . `` We do not yet know the scope of the intrusion , but we are working closely with information security consultants and law enforcement to determine its source and impact , '' the university said .
4 Canadians , 1 American are charged in what the U.S. alleges is a massive hacking conspiracy . 2 of the accused are in custody , the other 3 are at large , the U.S. Department of Justice says . They allegedly stole , sold over 160 credit / debit card numbers for tens of millions of dollars . The announcement came the same day the University experienced ` ` an apparent breach ''