The FBI has proudly announced the closure of a “dangerous hacker exchange” that trades in stolen internet data. However, the great success of the American and Polish investigators did not last long…because within two weeks the cybercriminals were back in action.
Last month, international law enforcement carried out a high-profile operation that arrested more than 100 people involved in online crimes. The hackers were linked to the cybercrime exchange Genesis Market. Although a great success was announced and the closure of the illegal site… it only returned to work two weeks after the police action.
Genesis Market closed due to big FBI action - Poles helped
In early April, investigators from 17 countries carried out a synchronized operation codenamed Cookie Monster. The FBI, Europol and the Dutch police took the lead. The Polish Central Bureau for Combating Cybercrime also took part in the operation.
Police entered 208 sites almost simultaneously and arrested 119 people. All of them were associated with the Genesis Market hacker exchange. This service was engaged in the sale of confidential data of Internet users - logins and passwords to accounts on services such as Netflix, IP addresses, cookies and other data known as the so-called. digital fingerprints.
The entire operation has been described as highly successful and “the largest of its kind”. Investigators blocked a website running on the Internet and protected nearly 80 million sets of Internet user data.
Genesis Market is working again - hackers played on the nose of the FBI
As it turns out now, the success of law enforcement officers did not last long. A few days ago, a new entry appeared on an identical copy of the Genesis Market page on the dark web. This indicated that the huge market was “fully operational again.”
This is evidenced by the data of experts in the field of cybersecurity. Netacea has been monitoring the status and activity of the Genesis Market on the dark web for some time now. According to them, the transactions of the stolen data stopped only about two weeks after the Cookie Monster promotion.
“Blocking the actions of cybercriminals is like fighting weeds in a garden. If left unrooted, they will return to the surface after a while, says Cyril Noel-Tago, chief security researcher at Netacea.
Despite the arrests, the Genesis Market structure — the website administrators, the dark website, and the entire malware infrastructure — has not been affected by the recent police action.
Source: Wprost
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