A Nigerian citizen residing in Mexico, Matthew A. Akande, was sentenced to eight years in prison by a federal court in Boston for his involvement in a scheme targeting Massachusetts tax preparation firms. U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani also ordered Akande, 37, to serve three years of supervised release and pay $1,393,230 in restitution.
Akande was arrested at Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom in October 2024 at the request of U.S. authorities and extradited to the United States on March 5, 2025. He had been indicted by a federal grand jury in July 2022 on charges including conspiracy to obtain unauthorized access to protected computers for fraud, wire fraud, unauthorized computer access, theft of government money, and aggravated identity theft.
Between June 2016 and June 2021, Akande worked with others to steal funds from the U.S. government by using personally identifiable information (PII) of taxpayers to file fraudulent tax returns. The group obtained this information through phishing attacks and computer intrusions targeting Massachusetts tax preparation firms.
According to prosecutors, Akande sent fraudulent phishing emails to five tax preparation firms posing as a potential client. These emails contained remote access trojan malware such as Warzone RAT. Once installed, the malware allowed Akande access to clients’ PII and previous tax records. Using this data, he filed fraudulent tax returns requesting refunds that were deposited into accounts controlled by co-conspirators in the United States.
After receiving the refunds, co-conspirators withdrew cash and transferred part of it to third parties in Mexico under Akande’s direction while retaining some for themselves. Over five years, more than 1,000 false tax returns were filed seeking over $8.1 million; more than $1.3 million was successfully obtained.
Federal officials encourage businesses that suspect they have been targeted or victimized by cyberattacks to file complaints with the Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.ic3.gov. Taxpayers or firms affected by phishing attacks are advised to forward suspicious emails to phishing@irs.gov.
“United States Attorney Leah B. Foley; Ted E. Docks, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Boston Division; and Thomas Demeo, Acting Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigations in Boston made the announcement.” “The Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs coordinated with authorities in the United Kingdom to secure the extradition of Akande.” “Assistant U.S. Attorney David M. Holcomb of the Criminal Division prosecuted the case.”