Cybercriminals are selling hundreds of thousands of credential sets stolen with the help of a cracked version of Acunetix, a powerful commercial web app vulnerability scanner, new research finds. The cracked software is being resold as a cloud-based attack tool…
Category: Krebs on Security
How to Lose a Fortune with Just One Bad Click
Adam Griffin is still in disbelief over how quickly he was robbed of nearly $500,000 in cryptocurrencies. A scammer called using a real Google phone number to warn his Gmail account was being hacked, sent email security alerts directly from…
How Cryptocurrency Turns to Cash in Russian Banks
A financial firm registered in Canada has emerged as the payment processor for dozens of Russian cryptocurrency exchanges and websites hawking cybercrime services aimed at Russian-speaking customers, new research finds. Meanwhile, an investigation into the Vancouver street address used by…
Patch Tuesday, December 2024 Edition
Microsoft today released updates to plug at least 70 security holes in Windows and Windows software, including one vulnerability that is already being exploited in active attacks. The zero-day seeing exploitation involves CVE-2024-49138, a security weakness in the Windows Common……
U.S. Offered $10M for Hacker Just Arrested by Russia
In January 2022, KrebsOnSecurity identified a Russian man named Mikhail Matveev as “Wazawaka,” a cybercriminal who was deeply involved in the formation and operation of multiple ransomware groups. The U.S. government indicted Matveev as a top ransomware purveyor a year…
Why Phishers Love New TLDs Like .shop, .top and .xyz
Phishing attacks increased nearly 40 percent in the year ending August 2024, with much of that growth concentrated at a small number of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) — such as .shop, .top, .xyz — that attract scammers with rock-bottom…
Hacker in Snowflake Extortions May Be a U.S. Soldier
Two men have been arrested for allegedly stealing data from and extorting dozens of companies that used the cloud data storage company Snowflake, but a third suspect — a prolific hacker known as Kiberphant0m — remains at large and continues…
Feds Charge Five Men in ‘Scattered Spider’ Roundup
Federal prosecutors in Los Angeles this week unsealed criminal charges against five men alleged to be members of a hacking group responsible for dozens of cyber intrusions at major U.S. technology companies between 2021 and 2023, including LastPass, MailChimp, Okta,…
Fintech Giant Finastra Investigating Data Breach
The financial technology firm Finastra is investigating the alleged large-scale theft of information from its internal file transfer platform, KrebsOnSecurity has learned. Finastra, which provides software and services to 45 of the world’s top 50 banks, notified customers of a…
An Interview With the Target & Home Depot Hacker
In December 2023, KrebsOnSecurity revealed the real-life identity of Rescator, the nickname used by a Russian cybercriminal who sold more than 100 million payment cards stolen from Target and Home Depot between 2013 and 2014. Moscow resident Mikhail Shefel, who…
Microsoft Patch Tuesday, November 2024 Edition
Microsoft today released updates to plug at least 89 security holes in its Windows operating systems and other software. November’s patch batch includes fixes for two zero-day vulnerabilities that are already being exploited by attackers, as well as two other…
FBI: Spike in Hacked Police Emails, Fake Subpoenas
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is urging police departments and governments worldwide to beef up security around their email systems, citing a recent increase in cybercriminal services that use hacked police email accounts to send unauthorized subpoenas and customer…
Canadian Man Arrested in Snowflake Data Extortions
A 26-year-old man in Ontario, Canada has been arrested for allegedly stealing data from and extorting more than 160 companies that used the cloud data service Snowflake. On October 30, Canadian authorities arrested Alexander Moucka, a.k.a. Connor Riley Moucka of…
Booking.com Phishers May Leave You With Reservations
A number of cybercriminal innovations are making it easier for scammers to cash in on your upcoming travel plans. This story examines a recent spear-phishing campaign that ensued when a California hotel had its booking.com credentials stolen. We’ll also explore…
Change Healthcare Breach Hits 100M Americans
Change Healthcare says it has notified approximately 100 million Americans that their personal, financial and healthcare records may have been stolen in a February 2024 ransomware attack that caused the largest ever known data breach of protected health information. This…
The Global Surveillance Free-for-All in Mobile Ad Data
Not long ago, the ability to remotely track someone’s daily movements just by knowing their home address, employer, or place of worship was considered a powerful surveillance tool that should only be in the purview of nation states. But a…
The Global Surveillance Free-for-All in Mobile Ad Data
Not long ago, the ability to remotely track someone’s daily movements just by knowing their home address, employer, or place of worship was considered a powerful surveillance tool that should only be in the purview of nation states. But a…
Brazil Arrests ‘USDoD,’ Hacker in FBI Infragard Breach
Brazilian authorities reportedly have arrested a 33-year-old man on suspicion of being “USDoD,” a prolific cybercriminal who rose to infamy in 2022 after infiltrating the FBI’s InfraGard program and leaking contact information for 80,000 members. More recently, USDoD was behind…
Sudanese Brothers Arrested in ‘AnonSudan’ Takedown
The U.S. government on Wednesday announced the arrest and charging of two Sudanese brothers accused of running Anonymous Sudan (a.k.a. AnonSudan), a cybercrime business known for launching powerful distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks against a range of targets, including dozens of…
Lamborghini Carjackers Lured by $243M Cyberheist
The parents of a 19-year-old Connecticut honors student accused of taking part in a $243 million cryptocurrency heist in August were carjacked a week later, while out house-hunting in a brand new Lamborghini. Prosecutors say the couple was beaten and…
Patch Tuesday, October 2024 Edition
Microsoft today released security updates to fix at least 117 security holes in Windows computers and other software, including two vulnerabilities that are already seeing active attacks. Also, Adobe plugged 52 security holes across a range of products, and Apple…
A Single Cloud Compromise Can Feed an Army of AI Sex Bots
Organizations that get relieved of credentials to their cloud environments can quickly find themselves part of a disturbing new trend: Cybercriminals using stolen cloud credentials to operate and resell sexualized AI-powered chat services. Researchers say these illicit chat bots, which…
Crooked Cops, Stolen Laptops & the Ghost of UGNazi
A California man accused of failing to pay taxes on tens of millions of dollars allegedly earned from cybercrime also paid local police officers hundreds of thousands of dollars to help him extort, intimidate and silence rivals and former business…
U.S. Indicts 2 Top Russian Hackers, Sanctions Cryptex
The United States today unveiled sanctions and indictments against the alleged proprietor of Joker’s Stash, a now-defunct cybercrime store that peddled tens of millions of payment cards stolen in some of the largest data breaches of the past decade. The…
Timeshare Owner? The Mexican Drug Cartels Want You
The FBI is warning timeshare owners to be wary of a prevalent telemarketing scam involving a violent Mexican drug cartel that tries to trick elderly people into believing someone wants to buy their property. This is the story of a…
This Windows PowerShell Phish Has Scary Potential
Many GitHub users this week received a novel phishing email warning of critical security holes in their code. Those who clicked the link for details were asked to distinguish themselves from bots by pressing a combination of keyboard keys that…
Scam ‘Funeral Streaming’ Groups Thrive on Facebook
Scammers are flooding Facebook with groups that purport to offer video streaming of funeral services for the recently deceased. Friends and family who follow the links for the streaming services are then asked to cough up their credit card information.…
The Dark Nexus Between Harm Groups and ‘The Com’
A cyberattack that shut down some of the top casinos in Las Vegas last year quickly became one of the most riveting security stories of 2023: It was the first known case of native English-speaking hackers in the United States…
Bug Left Some Windows PCs Dangerously Unpatched
Microsoft Corp. today released updates to fix at least 79 security vulnerabilities in its Windows operating systems and related software, including multiple flaws that are already showing up in active attacks. Microsoft also corrected a critical bug that has caused…
Sextortion Scams Now Include Photos of Your Home
An old but persistent email scam known as “sextortion” has a new personalized touch: The missives, which claim that malware has captured webcam footage of recipients pleasuring themselves, now include a photo of the target’s home in a bid to make…
Owners of 1-Time Passcode Theft Service Plead Guilty
Three men in the United Kingdom have pleaded guilty to operating otp[.]agency, a once popular online service that helped attackers intercept the one-time passcodes (OTPs) that many websites require as a second authentication factor in addition to passwords. Launched in…
When Get-Out-The-Vote Efforts Look Like Phishing
Multiple media reports this week warned Americans to be on guard against a new phishing scam that arrives in a text message informing recipients they are not yet registered to vote. A bit of digging reveals the missives were sent…
New 0-Day Attacks Linked to China’s ‘Volt Typhoon’
Malicious hackers are exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Versa Director, a software product used by many Internet and IT service providers. Researchers believe the activity is linked to Volt Typhoon, a Chinese cyber espionage group focused on infiltrating critical U.S.…
Local Networks Go Global When Domain Names Collide
The proliferation of new top-level domains (TLDs) has exacerbated a well-known security weakness: Many organizations set up their internal Microsoft authentication systems years ago using domain names in TLDs that didn’t exist at the time. Meaning, they are continuously sending…
National Public Data Published Its Own Passwords
New details are emerging about a breach at National Public Data (NPD), a consumer data broker that recently spilled hundreds of millions of Americans’ Social Security Numbers, addresses, and phone numbers online. KrebsOnSecurity has learned that another NPD data broker…
NationalPublicData.com Hack Exposes a Nation’s Data
A great many readers this month reported receiving alerts that their Social Security Number, name, address and other personal information were exposed in a breach at a little-known but aptly-named consumer data broker called NationalPublicData.com. This post examines what we…
Six 0-Days Lead Microsoft’s August 2024 Patch Push
Microsoft today released updates to fix at least 90 security vulnerabilities in Windows and related software, including a whopping six zero-day flaws that are already being actively exploited by attackers. This article has been indexed from Krebs on Security Read…
Cybercrime Rapper Sues Bank over Fraud Investigation
In January, KrebsOnSecurity wrote about rapper Punchmade Dev, whose music videos sing the praises of a cybercrime lifestyle. That story showed how Punchmade’s social media profiles promoted Punchmade-themed online stores selling bank account and payment card data. Now the Kentucky…
Low-Drama ‘Dark Angels’ Reap Record Ransoms
A ransomware group called Dark Angels made headlines this past week when it was revealed the crime group recently received a record $75 million data ransom payment from a Fortune 50 company. Security experts say the Dark Angels have been…
U.S. Trades Cybercriminals to Russia in Prisoner Swap
Twenty-four prisoners were freed today in an international prisoner swap between Russia and Western countries. Among the eight Russians repatriated were five convicted cybercriminals. In return, Russia has reportedly released 16 prisoners, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and…
U.S. Trades 5 Cybercriminals to Russia in Prisoner Swap
Twenty-four prisoners were freed today in an international prisoner swap between Russia and Western countries. Among the eight Russians repatriated were five convicted cybercriminals. In return, Russia has reportedly released 16 prisoners, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and…
Don’t Let Your Domain Name Become a “Sitting Duck”
More than a million domain names — including many registered by Fortune 100 firms and brand protection companies — are vulnerable to takeover by cybercriminals thanks to authentication weaknesses at a number of large web hosting providers and domain registrars,…
Crooks Bypassed Google’s Email Verification to Create Workspace Accounts, Access 3rd-Party Services
Google says it recently fixed an authentication weakness that allowed crooks to circumvent email verification needed to create a Google Workspace account, and leverage that to impersonate a domain holder to third-party services that allow logins through Google’s “Sign in with…
Phish-Friendly Domain Registry “.top” Put on Notice
The Chinese company in charge of handing out domain names ending in “.top” has been given until mid-August 2024 to show that it has put in place systems for managing phishing reports and suspending abusive domains, or else forfeit its…
Global Microsoft Meltdown Tied to Bad Crowdstrike Update
A faulty software update from cybersecurity vendor Crowdstrike crippled countless Microsoft Windows computers across the globe today, disrupting everything from airline travel and financial institutions to hospitals and businesses online. Crowdstrike said a fix has been deployed, but experts say…
Global Microsoft Meltdown Tied to Bad Crowstrike Update
A faulty software update from cybersecurity vendor Crowdstrike crippled countless Microsoft Windows computers across the globe today, disrupting everything from airline travel and financial institutions to hospitals and businesses online. Crowdstrike said a fix has been deployed, but experts say…
Researchers: Weak Security Defaults Enabled Squarespace Domains Hijacks
At least a dozen organizations with domain names at domain registrar Squarespace saw their websites hijacked last week. Squarespace bought all assets of Google Domains a year ago, but many customers still haven’t set up their new accounts. Experts say…
Crooks Steal Phone, SMS Records for Nearly All AT&T Customers
AT&T Corp. disclosed today that a new data breach has exposed phone call and text message records for roughly 110 million people — nearly all of its customers. AT&T said it delayed disclosing the incident in response to “national security…
Hackers Steal Phone, SMS Records for Nearly All AT&T Customers
AT&T Corp. disclosed today that a new data breach has exposed phone call and text message records for roughly 110 million people — nearly all of its customers. AT&T said it delayed disclosing the incident in response to “national security…
The Stark Truth Behind the Resurgence of Russia’s Fin7
The Russia-based cybercrime group dubbed “Fin7,” known for phishing and malware attacks that have cost victim organizations an estimated $3 billion in losses since 2013, was declared dead last year by U.S. authorities. But experts say Fin7 has roared back…
Microsoft Patch Tuesday, July 2024 Edition
Microsoft Corp. today issued software updates to plug 139 security holes in various flavors of Windows and other Microsoft products. Redmond says attackers are already exploiting at least two of the vulnerabilities in active attacks against Windows users. This article…
The Not-So-Secret Network Access Broker x999xx
Most accomplished cybercriminals go out of their way to separate their real names from their hacker handles. But among certain old-school Russian hackers it is not uncommon to find major players who have done little to prevent people from figuring…
KrebsOnSecurity Threatened with Defamation Lawsuit Over Fake Radaris CEO
On March 8, 2024, KrebsOnSecurity published a deep dive on the consumer data broker Radaris, showing how the original owners are two men in Massachusetts who operated multiple Russian language dating services and affiliate programs, in addition to a dizzying…
Alleged Boss of ‘Scattered Spider’ Hacking Group Arrested
A 22-year-old man from the United Kingdom arrested this week in Spain is allegedly the ringleader of Scattered Spider, a cybercrime group suspected of hacking into Twilio, LastPass, DoorDash, Mailchimp, and nearly 130 other organizations over the past two years.…
Patch Tuesday, June 2024 “Recall” Edition
Microsoft today released updates to fix more than 50 security vulnerabilities in Windows and related software, a relatively light Patch Tuesday this month for Windows administrators. The software giant also responded to a torrent of negative feedback on a new…
‘Operation Endgame’ Hits Malware Delivery Platforms
Law enforcement agencies in the United States and Europe today announced Operation Endgame, a coordinated action against some of the most popular cybercrime platforms for delivering ransomware and data-stealing malware. Dubbed “the largest ever operation against botnets,” the international effort…
Is Your Computer Part of ‘The Largest Botnet Ever?’
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) today said they arrested the alleged operator of 911 S5, a ten-year-old online anonymity service that was powered by what the director of the FBI called “likely the world’s largest botnet ever.” The arrest…
Treasury Sanctions Creators of 911 S5 Proxy Botnet
The U.S. Department of the Treasury today unveiled sanctions against three Chinese nationals for allegedly operating 911 S5, an online anonymity service that for many years was the easiest and cheapest way to route one’s Web traffic through malware-infected computers…
Stark Industries Solutions: An Iron Hammer in the Cloud
Two weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, a large, mysterious new Internet hosting firm called Stark Industries Solutions materialized and quickly became the epicenter of massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on government and commercial targets in Ukraine and…
Why Your Wi-Fi Router Doubles as an Apple AirTag
Apple and the satellite-based broadband service Starlink each recently took steps to address new research into the potential security and privacy implications of how their services geo-locate devices. Researchers from the University of Maryland say they relied on publicly available…
Patch Tuesday, May 2024 Edition
Microsoft today released updates to fix more than 60 security holes in Windows computers and supported software, including two “zero-day” vulnerabilities in Windows that are already being exploited in active attacks. There are also important security patches available for macOS…
How Did Authorities Identify the Alleged Lockbit Boss?
Last week, the United States joined the U.K. and Australia in sanctioning and charging a Russian man named Dmitry Yuryevich Khoroshev as the leader of the infamous LockBit ransomware group. LockBit’s leader “LockBitSupp” claims the feds named the wrong guy,…
U.S. Charges Russian Man as Boss of LockBit Ransomware Group
The United States joined the United Kingdom and Australia today in sanctioning 31-year-old Russian national Dmitry Yuryevich Khoroshev as the alleged leader of the infamous ransomware group LockBit. The U.S. Department of Justice also indicted Khoroshev as the gang’s leader…
Why Your VPN May Not Be As Secure As It Claims
Virtual private networking (VPN) companies market their services as a way to prevent anyone from snooping on your Internet usage. But new research suggests this is a dangerous assumption when connecting to a VPN via an untrusted network, because attackers…
Man Who Mass-Extorted Psychotherapy Patients Gets Six Years
A 26-year-old Finnish man was sentenced to more than six years in prison today after being convicted of hacking into an online psychotherapy clinic, leaking tens of thousands of patient therapy records, and attempting to extort the clinic and patients.…
FCC Fines Major U.S. Wireless Carriers for Selling Customer Location Data
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today levied fines totaling nearly $200 million against the four major carriers — including AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon — for illegally sharing access to customers’ location information without consent. This article has been…
Russian FSB Counterintelligence Chief Gets 9 Years in Cybercrime Bribery Scheme
The head of counterintelligence for a division of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) was sentenced last week to nine years in a penal colony for accepting a USD $1.7 million bribe to ignore the activities of a prolific Russian…
Who Stole 3.6M Tax Records from South Carolina?
For nearly a dozen years, residents of South Carolina have been kept in the dark by state and federal investigators over who was responsible for hacking into the state’s revenue department in 2012 and stealing tax and bank account information…
Crickets from Chirp Systems in Smart Lock Key Leak
The U.S. government is warning that smart locks securing entry to an estimated 50,000 dwellings nationwide contain hard-coded credentials that can be used to remotely open any of the locks. The lock’s maker Chirp Systems remains unresponsive, even though it…
Why CISA is Warning CISOs About a Breach at Sisense
The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said today it is investigating a breach at business intelligence company Sisense, whose products are designed to allow companies to view the status of multiple third-party online services in a single dashboard.…
Twitter’s Clumsy Pivot to X.com Is a Gift to Phishers
On April 9, Twitter/X began automatically modifying links that mention “twitter.com” to redirect to “x.com” instead. But over the past 48 hours, dozens of new domain names have been registered that demonstrate how this change could be used to craft…
April’s Patch Tuesday Brings Record Number of Fixes
Fake Lawsuit Threat Exposes Privnote Phishing Sites
A cybercrook who has been setting up websites that mimic the self-destructing message service Privnote.com accidentally exposed the breadth of their operations recently when they threatened to sue a software company. The disclosure revealed a profitable network of phishing sites…
‘The Manipulaters’ Improve Phishing, Still Fail at Opsec
Roughly nine years ago, KrebsOnSecurity profiled a Pakistan-based cybercrime group called “The Manipulaters,” a sprawling web hosting network of phishing and spam delivery platforms. In January 2024, The Manipulaters pleaded with this author to unpublish previous stories about their work,…
Thread Hijacking: Phishes That Prey on Your Curiosity
Thread hijacking attacks. They happen when someone you know has their email account compromised, and you are suddenly dropped into an existing conversation between the sender and someone else. These missives draw on the recipient’s natural curiosity about being copied…
Recent ‘MFA Bombing’ Attacks Targeting Apple Users
Several Apple customers recently reported being targeted in elaborate phishing attacks that involve what appears to be a bug in Apple’s password reset feature. In this scenario, a target’s Apple devices are forced to display dozens of system-level prompts that…
Mozilla Drops Onerep After CEO Admits to Running People-Search Networks
The nonprofit organization that supports the Firefox web browser said today it is winding down its new partnership with Onerep, an identity protection service recently bundled with Firefox that offers to remove users from hundreds of people-search sites. The move…
The Not-so-True People-Search Network from China
It’s not unusual for the data brokers behind people-search websites to use pseudonyms in their day-to-day lives (you would, too). Some of these personal data purveyors even try to reinvent their online identities in a bid to hide their conflicts…
CEO of Data Privacy Company Onerep.com Founded Dozens of People-Search Firms
The data privacy company Onerep.com bills itself as a Virginia-based service for helping people remove their personal information from almost 200 people-search websites. However, an investigation into the history of onerep.com finds this company is operating out of Belarus and…
Patch Tuesday, March 2024 Edition
Apple and Microsoft recently released software updates to fix dozens of security holes in their operating systems. Microsoft today patched at least 60 vulnerabilities in its Windows OS. Meanwhile, Apple’s new macOS Sonoma addresses at least 68 security weaknesses, and…
Incognito Darknet Market Mass-Extorts Buyers, Sellers
Borrowing from the playbook of ransomware purveyors, the darknet narcotics bazaar Incognito Market has begun extorting all of its vendors and buyers, threatening to publish cryptocurrency transaction and chat records of users who refuse to pay a fee ranging from…
A Close Up Look at the Consumer Data Broker Radaris
If you live in the United States, the data broker Radaris likely knows a great deal about you, and they are happy to sell what they know to anyone. But how much do we know about Radaris? Publicly available data…
BlackCat Ransomware Group Implodes After Apparent $22M Payment by Change Healthcare
There are indications that U.S. healthcare giant Change Healthcare has made a $22 million extortion payment to the infamous BlackCat ransomware group (a.k.a. “ALPHV”) as the company struggles to bring services back online amid a cyberattack that has disrupted prescription…
Fulton County, Security Experts Call LockBit’s Bluff
The ransomware group LockBit told officials with Fulton County, Ga. they could expect to see their internal documents published online this morning unless the county paid a ransom demand. Instead, LockBit removed Fulton County’s listing from its victim shaming website…
Calendar Meeting Links Used to Spread Mac Malware
Malicious hackers are targeting people in the cryptocurrency space in attacks that start with a link added to the target’s account at Calendly, a popular free calendar application for scheduling appointments and meetings. The attackers impersonate established cryptocurrency investors and…
FBI’s LockBit Takedown Postponed a Ticking Time Bomb in Fulton County, Ga.
The FBI’s takedown of the LockBit ransomware group last week came as LockBit was preparing to release sensitive data stolen from government computer systems in Fulton County, Ga. But LockBit is now regrouping, and the gang says it will publish…
New Leak Shows Business Side of China’s APT Menace
A new data leak that appears to have come from one of China’s top private cybersecurity firms provides a rare glimpse into the commercial side of China’s many state-sponsored hacking groups. Experts say the leak illustrates how Chinese government agencies…
Feds Seize LockBit Ransomware Websites, Offer Decryption Tools, Troll Affiliates
U.S. and U.K. authorities have seized the darknet websites run by LockBit, a prolific and destructive ransomware group that has claimed more than 2,000 victims worldwide and extorted over $120 million in payments. Instead of listing data stolen from ransomware…
U.S. Internet Leaked Years of Internal, Customer Emails
The Minnesota-based Internet provider U.S. Internet Corp. has a business unit called Securence, which specializes in providing filtered, secure email services to businesses, educational institutions and government agencies worldwide. But until it was notified last week, U.S. Internet was publishing…
Fat Patch Tuesday, February 2024 Edition
Microsoft Corp. today pushed software updates to plug more than 70 security holes in its Windows operating systems and related products, including two zero-day vulnerabilities that are already being exploited in active attacks. This article has been indexed from Krebs…
Juniper Support Portal Exposed Customer Device Info
Until earlier this week, the support website for networking equipment vendor Juniper Networks was exposing potentially sensitive information tied to customer products, including the exact devices each customer bought, as well as each device’s warranty status, service contracts and serial…
From Cybercrime Saul Goodman to the Russian GRU
In 2021, the exclusive Russian cybercrime forum Mazafaka was hacked. The leaked user database shows one of the forum’s founders was an attorney who advised Russia’s top hackers on the legal risks of their work, and what to do if…
Arrests in $400M SIM-Swap Tied to Heist at FTX?
Three Americans were charged this week with stealing more than $400 million in a November 2022 SIM-swapping attack. The U.S. government did not name the victim organization, but there is every indication that the money was stolen from the now-defunct…
Fla. Man Charged in SIM-Swapping Spree is Key Suspect in Hacker Groups Oktapus, Scattered Spider
On Jan. 9, 2024, U.S. authorities arrested a 19-year-old Florida man charged with wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and conspiring with others to use SIM-swapping to steal cryptocurrency. Sources close to the investigation tell KrebsOnSecurity the accused was a key…
Who is Alleged Medibank Hacker Aleksandr Ermakov?
Authorities in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States this week levied financial sanctions against a Russian man accused of stealing data on nearly 10 million customers of the Australian health insurance giant Medibank. 33-year-old Aleksandr Ermakov allegedly stole…
Using Google Search to Find Software Can Be Risky
Google continues to struggle with cybercriminals running malicious ads on its search platform to trick people into downloading booby-trapped copies of popular free software applications. The malicious ads, which appear above organic search results and often precede links to legitimate…
Canadian Man Stuck in Triangle of E-Commerce Fraud
A Canadian man who says he’s been falsely charged with orchestrating a complex e-commerce scam is seeking to clear his name. His case appears to involve “triangulation fraud,” which occurs when a consumer purchases something online — from a seller…
E-Crime Rapper ‘Punchmade Dev’ Debuts Card Shop
The rapper and social media personality Punchmade Dev is perhaps best known for his flashy videos singing the praises of a cybercrime lifestyle. With memorable hits such as “Internet Swiping” and “Million Dollar Criminal” earning millions of views, Punchmade has…
Here’s Some Bitcoin: Oh, and You’ve Been Served!
A California man who lost $100,000 in a 2021 SIM-swapping attack is suing the unknown holder of a cryptocurrency wallet that harbors his stolen funds. The case is thought to be first in which a federal court has recognized the……
Meet Ika & Sal: The Bulletproof Hosting Duo from Hell
In 2020, the United States brought charges against four men accused of building a bulletproof hosting empire that once dominated the Russian cybercrime industry and supported multiple organized cybercrime groups. All four pleaded guilty to conspiracy and racketeering charges. But…