Tag Archives: rescator

U.S. Offered $10M for Hacker Just Arrested by Russia

December 4, 2024
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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 later, offering $10 million for information leading to his arrest. Last week, the Russian government reportedly arrested Matveev and charged him with creating malware used to extort companies.

Who Stole 3.6M Tax Records from South Carolina?

April 16, 2024
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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 for 3.6 million people. The answer may no longer be a mystery: KrebsOnSecurity found compelling clues suggesting the intrusion was carried out by the same Russian hacking crew that stole of millions of payment card records from big box retailers like Home Depot and Target in the years that followed.

Meet Ika & Sal: The Bulletproof Hosting Duo from Hell

January 8, 2024
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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 there is a fascinating and untold backstory behind the two Russian men involved, who co-ran Russia’s most popular spam forum for years.

Who’s Behind the Screencam Extortion Scam?

August 25, 2018
36 Comments

The sextortion email scam last month that invoked a real password used by each recipient and threatened to release embarrassing Webcam videos almost certainly was not the work of one criminal or even one group of criminals. Rather, it’s likely that additional spammers and scammers piled on with their own versions of the phishing email after noticing that some recipients were actually paying up. The truth is we may never find out who’s responsible, but it’s still fun to follow some promising early leads and see where they take us.

U.S. Arrests 13, Charges 36 in ‘Infraud’ Cybercrime Forum Bust

February 8, 2018
33 Comments

The U.S. Justice Department announced charges on Wednesday against three dozen individuals thought to be key members of ‘Infraud,” a long-running cybercrime forum that federal prosecutors say cost consumers more than a half billion dollars. In conjunction with the forum takedown, 13 alleged Infraud members from the United States and six other countries were arrested.

Started in October 2010, Infraud was short for “In Fraud We Trust,” and collectively the forum referred to itself as the “Ministry of Fraudulently [sic] Affairs.” As a mostly English-language fraud forum, Infraud attracted nearly 11,000 members from around the globe who sold, traded and bought everything from stolen identities and credit card accounts to ATM skimmers, botnet hosting and malicious software.

Trump’s Dumps: ‘Making Dumps Great Again’

May 26, 2017
56 Comments

It’s not uncommon for crooks who peddle stolen credit cards to seize on iconic American figures of wealth and power in the digital advertisements for these shops that run continuously on various cybercrime forums. Exhibit A: McDumpals, a hugely popular carding site that borrows the Ronald McDonald character from McDonald’s and caters to bulk buyers. Exhibit B: Uncle Sam’s dumps shop, which wants YOU! to buy American. Today, we’ll look at an up and coming credit card shop called Trump’s-Dumps, which invokes 45’s likeness and promises to “make credit card fraud great again.”

When Undercover Credit Card Buys Go Bad

December 7, 2015
55 Comments

I recently heard from a source in law enforcement who had a peculiar problem. The source investigates cybercrime, and he was reaching out for advice after trying but failing to conduct undercover buys of stolen credit cards from a well-known underground card market. Turns out, the cybercrime bazaar’s own security system triggered a “pig alert” and brazenly flagged the fed’s transactions as an undercover purchase placed by a law enforcement officer.

Deconstructing the 2014 Sally Beauty Breach

May 7, 2015
54 Comments

This week, nationwide beauty products chain Sally Beauty disclosed that, for the second time in a year, it was investigating reports that hackers had broken into its networks and stolen customer credit card data. That investigation is ongoing, but I recently had an opportunity to interview a former Sally Beauty IT technician who provided a first-hand look at how the first breach in 2014 breach went down.