How soon will the attackers migrate the infrastructure and continue their illegal activities?
The FBI, together with international law enforcement agencies, took control of the BreachForums website and Telegram channel. The operation took place on Wednesday, May 15, a few days after the publication on the website of information allegedly stolen from the Europol database.
Now the BreachForums website has posted a message: "This site was shut down by the FBI and the US Department of Justice with the support of international partners. We analyze site data. If you have any information about cybercrime activity on BreachForums, please contact us."
The operation involved countries from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, which includes Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, and the police of Switzerland, Iceland and Ukraine actively assisted them.
BreachForums has long been a headache for law enforcement agencies. Its former administrator, Conor Brian Fitzpatrick, who goes by the pseudonym "Pompourin," was sentenced to 20 years of probation in January, but the site resurfaced and continued to sell stolen data.
BreachForums replaced RaidForums, which was shut down in 2022 after another joint police operation. Both sites traded stolen information and were used for so-called "double ransomware attacks", where data was not only encrypted to obtain ransom, but also stolen to threaten disclosure if the victim refused to pay.
If earlier the BreachForums site could only be accessed from the dark web, then from June 2023 to May 2024, the platform managed by the ShinyHunters group operated completely openly and was accessible from the Internet without TOR, VPN or other tricks.
Although the closure of BreachForums is a significant blow to cybercriminals, the probability of new similar forums appearing or moving this particular forum to a new address remains extremely high.
After all, this is a multibillion-dollar industry, and until law enforcement comes up with a qualitatively new and effective way to "put a spoke in the wheel" of hackers, their business will continue to live.
The FBI, together with international law enforcement agencies, took control of the BreachForums website and Telegram channel. The operation took place on Wednesday, May 15, a few days after the publication on the website of information allegedly stolen from the Europol database.
Now the BreachForums website has posted a message: "This site was shut down by the FBI and the US Department of Justice with the support of international partners. We analyze site data. If you have any information about cybercrime activity on BreachForums, please contact us."
The operation involved countries from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, which includes Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, and the police of Switzerland, Iceland and Ukraine actively assisted them.
BreachForums has long been a headache for law enforcement agencies. Its former administrator, Conor Brian Fitzpatrick, who goes by the pseudonym "Pompourin," was sentenced to 20 years of probation in January, but the site resurfaced and continued to sell stolen data.
BreachForums replaced RaidForums, which was shut down in 2022 after another joint police operation. Both sites traded stolen information and were used for so-called "double ransomware attacks", where data was not only encrypted to obtain ransom, but also stolen to threaten disclosure if the victim refused to pay.
If earlier the BreachForums site could only be accessed from the dark web, then from June 2023 to May 2024, the platform managed by the ShinyHunters group operated completely openly and was accessible from the Internet without TOR, VPN or other tricks.
Although the closure of BreachForums is a significant blow to cybercriminals, the probability of new similar forums appearing or moving this particular forum to a new address remains extremely high.
After all, this is a multibillion-dollar industry, and until law enforcement comes up with a qualitatively new and effective way to "put a spoke in the wheel" of hackers, their business will continue to live.
