A Canadian man has pleaded guilty to hacking charges over his involvement in hacking Yahoo Inc. in 2014.

Twenty-two-year-old Kazakhstan-born Karim Baratov was indicted by the Department of Justice in February on claims that he was hired by alleged Russian intelligence agents Igor Suschin and Dmitry Dokuchaev along with a Russian national named Alexsey Belan to hack Yahoo’s servers. Their goal was to obtain personal and financial information from users, including government officials and journalists.

“The illegal hacking of private communications is a global problem that transcends political boundaries,” U.S. Attorney Brian Stretch said in a statement. “Cybercrime is not only a grave threat to personal privacy and security, but causes great financial harm to individuals who are hacked and costs the world economy hundreds of billions of dollars every year.”

As part of a plea bargain agreement, Baratov also confessed to being in the employment of Russia when he was involved in the hack and further admitted that he “spearphished” his victims, tricking them into visiting web pages he constructed to appear legitimate.

Yahoo first reported the hack Baratov was involved with in September 2016, two years after it occurred and only after the compromised account details were offered for sale on the dark web, a part of the internet available only through the use of certain software. The hack was one of two Yahoo confessed to last year, with the second hack, dating from August 2013, believed to have included the account details of 3 billion users, making it the largest hack of all time.

Baratov’s co-accused are believed to reside in Russia and, with no extradition treaty between the two countries, they’re unlikely to be arrested unless they are caught outside the country. Baratov himself will face a sentencing hearing Feb. 20.

Photo: Karim Baratov/Facebook