Ransomware crooks offer $1 million for “partners in crime”
The developers of a popular strain of ransomware are actively seeking other cyber crooks to recruit to help them steal money from innocent victims, and they’ve reportedly deposited $1 million into a “hacker fund” as an incentive.
It’s a job vacancy with a very sinister twist. But you won’t find these vacancies posted on your typical job recruitment websites or local newspapers. Rather, head to obscure hacker forums on the Dark Web, where the developers of a popular strain of ransomware known as REvil are looking for other cyber-criminals with specific skillsets to help them make money by infecting computers and networks.
And to prove that they’re the real deal, Bleeping Computer reports that the developers have deposited around $1 million into a Bitcoin account.
It’s the latest worrying development in the RaaS industry (we explain what that means below.)
To quickly recap on previous articles, ransomware is a type of malware that – upon infecting a computer or network – encrypts important files, rendering them useless. If the encryption is good enough, a victim’s only hope of recovering those files is to pay a ransom to get them back (of course, having a recent back-up means you don’t need to pay up.)
Raas stands for Ransomware-as-a-service. It describes a partnership between those who specialise in developing ransomware and those who specialise in infecting computers and networks. The ransomware developers effectively hire out their malware to other crooks who are then responsible for infecting machines and collecting the ransoms. The pot in then split, with the developers getting about a third and the operators about two thirds.
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Ransomware-as-a-service (Raas) has become increasingly prolific, and is especially dangerous since cyber-crooks are increasing their ability to infect machines by sharing their knowledge and skillsets, as opposed to going it alone.
However, the industry has developed to such an extent that those looking to partner with those who develop the REvil ransomware are actually vetted and interviewed to prove their aptitude. And those who are successful know that there is money to be made since the ransomware developers deposited a hefty million dollars into a Bitcoin wallet owned by the moderators of the hacker forum in which they posted.
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With money like that being flippantly thrown around, it’s another worrying signal that ransomware is still very much a lucrative business, and as long as the crooks are still able to infect machines and victims will still pay the ransom fees, it isn’t going away any time soon.
Read our full article on ransomware as well as how to avoid it here.
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