Former Ransomware Negotiator Sentenced to 70 Months in Prison for Secretly Helping BlackCat Gang

Pierluigi Paganini
July 10, 2026

A former ransomware negotiator was sentenced to nearly six years for secretly helping BlackCat extort victims while betraying his clients.

A U.S. court sentenced former ransomware negotiator Angelo Martino, 41, to 70 months in prison for conspiring with the BlackCat ransomware gang. While negotiating on behalf of five victims, he secretly shared confidential information about their strategies and willingness to pay with the attackers.

Prosecutors described him as a “double agent” who helped maximize ransom payments while profiting from the criminal operation.

“Angelo Martino, 41, of Land O’Lakes, Florida, formerly employed as a ransomware negotiator, was sentenced today to 70 months for his role in conspiring with Blackcat/ALPHV (BlackCat) actors to extort multiple victims, as well as conspiring with other former cybersecurity professionals to attack additional victims in 2023.” reads the press release published by DoJ.

In April, Martino admitted to helping the BlackCat ransomware group while working for a U.S. incident response firm.

The man secretly shared sensitive client details with attackers, like insurance limits and negotiation strategies, while acting as a ransomware negotiator. This information came from five victim cases starting in April 2023 and helped the gang demand higher ransoms. In return, he was reportedly paid by the ransomware operators.

“Angelo Martino’s victims shared heartbreaking accounts of how their businesses were nearly destroyed, while the people they hired to help them instead betrayed them to ransomware gangs,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “Today’s sentence accounts for the harm Martino caused and demonstrates that the Department of…

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Former Ransomware Negotiator Sentenced to 70 Months in Prison for Secretly Helping BlackCat Gang