Fighting Fake EDRs With ‘Credit Ratings’ for Police

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Wed, 27 Apr 2022 14:27:35 +0000

When KrebsOnSecurity last month explored how cybercriminals were using hacked email accounts at police departments worldwide to obtain warrantless Emergency Data Requests (EDRs) from social media and technology providers, many security experts called it a fundamentally unfixable problem. But don’t tell that to Matt Donahue, a former FBI agent who recently quit the agency to launch a startup that aims to help tech companies do a better job screening out phony law enforcement data requests — in part by assigning trustworthiness or “credit ratings” to law enforcement authorities worldwide.

Read more

RaidForums Gets Raided, Alleged Admin Arrested

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 12 Apr 2022 17:29:33 +0000

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) said today it seized the website and user database for RaidForums, an extremely popular English-language cybercrime forum that sold access to more than 10 billion consumer records stolen in some of the world’s largest data breaches since 2015. The DOJ also charged the alleged administrator of RaidForums — 21-year-old Diogo Santos Coelho, of Portugal — with six criminal counts, including conspiracy, access device fraud and aggravated identity theft.

Read more

Double-Your-Crypto Scams Share Crypto Scam Host

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2022 15:26:40 +0000

Online scams that try to separate the unwary from their cryptocurrency are a dime a dozen, but a great many seemingly disparate crypto scam websites tend to rely on the same dodgy infrastructure providers to remain online in the face of massive fraud and abuse complaints from their erstwhile customers. Here’s a closer look at hundreds of phony crypto investment schemes that are all connected through a hosting provider which caters to people running crypto scams.

Read more

Actions Target Russian Govt. Botnet, Hydra Dark Market

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Thu, 07 Apr 2022 22:03:45 +0000

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) says it has disrupted a giant botnet built and operated by a Russian government intelligence unit known for launching destructive cyberattacks against energy infrastructure in the United States and Ukraine. Separately, law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and Germany moved to decapitate “Hydra,” a billion-dollar Russian darknet drug bazaar that also helped to launder the profits of multiple Russian ransomware groups.

Read more

Fake Emergency Search Warrants Draw Scrutiny from Capitol Hill

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Thu, 31 Mar 2022 22:54:45 +0000

On Tuesday, KrebsOnSecurity warned that hackers increasingly are using compromised government and police department email accounts to obtain sensitive customer data from mobile providers, ISPs and social media companies. Today, one of the U.S. Senate’s most tech-savvy lawmakers said he was troubled by the report and is now asking technology companies and federal agencies for information about the frequency of such schemes.

Read more

Hackers Gaining Power of Subpoena Via Fake “Emergency Data Requests”

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2022 14:07:27 +0000

There is a terrifying and highly effective “method” that criminal hackers are now using to harvest sensitive customer data from Internet service providers, phone companies and social media firms. It involves compromising email accounts and websites tied to police departments and government agencies, and then sending unauthorized demands for subscriber data while claiming the information being requested can’t wait for a court order because it relates to an urgent matter of life and death.

Read more

‘Spam Nation’ Villain Vrublevsky Charged With Fraud

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2022 16:33:35 +0000

Pavel Vrublevsky, founder of the Russian payment technology firm ChronoPay and the antagonist in my 2014 book “Spam Nation,” was arrested in Moscow this month and charged with fraud. Russian authorities allege Vrublevsky operated several fraudulent SMS-based payment schemes, and facilitated money laundering for Hydra, the largest Russian darknet market. But according to information obtained by KrebsOnSecurity, it is equally likely Vrublevsky was arrested thanks to his propensity for carefully documenting the links between Russia’s state security services and the cybercriminal underground.

Read more

Russian Govt. Continues Carding Shop Crackdown

Credit to Author: BrianKrebs| Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2022 01:34:48 +0000

Russian authorities have arrested six men accused of operating some of the most active online bazaars for selling stolen payment card data. The crackdown — the second closure of major card fraud shops by Russian authorities in as many weeks — comes closely behind Russia’s arrest of 14 alleged affiliates of the REvil ransomware gang, and has many in the cybercrime underground asking who might be next.

Read more