The former Seattle software engineer charged in a data breach that is believed to have affected more than 30 companies pleaded not guilty to all charges Thursday.
Paige Thompson is charged with wire fraud and computer fraud and abuse for the intrusion into data of companies including Capital One. Thompson remains in custody, despite efforts by her lawyers to have her released to a halfway house.
According to her indictment, Thompson created scanning software that allowed her to access the servers of a cloud computing company. The 33-year-old who goes by the online alias "erratic" not only stole data but also used stolen computer power to "mine" cryptocurrency, according to the indictment.
Law enforcement has identified many of the victims. They include a state agency outside of Washington state, a public university outside of Washington state, and a telecommunications conglomerate outside of the United States.
Thompson, of Seattle, was arrested last month after the FBI said she obtained personal information from more than 100 million Capital One credit applications. There is no evidence the data was sold or distributed to others.
Capital One said among the information obtained by the hacker was 140,000 Social Security numbers and 80,000 bank account numbers. It said no credit card account numbers or log-in credentials were compromised.
A jury trial is scheduled for Nov. 4.
