Actually, since the bitcoin price went up for over 100% since the last time, we will temporarily decrease the fee to 5 ! Temporarily. We will be kind and will not increase your fee. However, the security firm noticed in the latest round of ransom letters that hackers are aware of the BTC prices surging: Why? What is wrong? Do you think you can mitigate our attacks? Do you think that it was a prank or that we will just give up? In any case, you are wrong.Īt the time of the first batch of letters sent by the threat actors, bitcoin was worth approximately $10,000. It’s a long time overdue and we did not receive payment. The other big increase has been in the realm of DDoS extortion campaigns. We asked for 10 bitcoin to be paid at to avoid getting your whole network DDoSed. This past year has seen a surge in crypto-coin prices, with Bitcoin (BTC) starting 2020 at around 8,000, ending the year around 30,000, and starting the new year with a peak of over 40,000. One of the first bitcoin ransom letters sent by the hackers reads as follow: Radware noted that most of the companies didn’t report such incidents to the media in August and September 2020. However, in the wake of the crypto bull-run seen over the last months, the wave of ransom letters had sharply increased, coming from the same actors. The firm claims the campaign is part of a global one that started in August last year. Bull Run Prices Push Extortionists to Increase Bitcoin Ransom DemandsĪccording to an alert issued by security firm Radware, there have been several reports between December 2020 and the first week of January 2021 about DDoS extortionists. Hackers are actively threatening companies with DDoS attacks unless they pay for bitcoin ransoms. Instead, companies are advised to request additional protection against any potential attacks from their security providers.Threat actors have been finding opportunities in bitcoin’s bullish trend to increase their extortion campaigns. Attackers used names such as Fancy Bear, Cozy Bear, Lazarus Group, and Armada Collective.īut towards the end of the year, Black Lotus Labs reported that some of these extortion emails were also signed using the name of Kadyrovtsy, the name of an elite Chechen military group that has also been associated with DDoS gangs and extortionists in the early 2010s.īoth Black Lotus Labs and Radware recommended that companies not pay the ransom as this merely invites more extortions in the future. Just like before, the DDoS extortion gangs also kept using the names of more famous hacking groups to send their threats, hoping to intimidated victims. The alleged hackers then demand 2 bitcoins or they. The former CenturyLink division, now part of Lumen, said these schemes never actually stopped, although the frequency of these email threats died down over the fall, compared to their prevalence over the summer. A new extortion email scam campaign is underway that states that your computer was hacked and that it was discovered you were hiding your taxes. Attacks typically lasted around nine hours and ranged around 200 Gbps, with one attack peaking at 237 Gbps.īut this resurgence in DDoS extortion tactics was also documented by Lumen's Black Lotus Labs, which reported on their comeback last week. Radware said it saw some organizations being targeted with DDoS attacks after receiving the extortion emails. According to Proofpoint, this time around the gang has been sending threatening, targeted emails to various organizations, including those operating in the energy, financial, insurance. Extortionists also had to adapt and reduce their demands over time, going from requesting 10 BTC to 5 BTC, as in some cases, the extortion fee would have been too large for some companies to pay, as the Bitcoin price tripled since August 2020.Īnd just like in the summer of 2020, Radware said that these DDoS extortion groups had the firepower to deliver on their threats. The security firm believes that the rise in the Bitcoin-to-USD price has led to some groups returning to or re-prioritizing DDoS extortion schemes.īut Radware said that the Bitcoin price surge was so sudden and unexpected that it caught even some groups by surprise. Radware said that some of the emails it seen were sent by a group that was active over the 2020 summer when the extortionists targeted many financial organizations across the world.Ĭompanies that received this group's emails last summer also received new threats over the winter, Radware said. In a security alert sent to its customers and shared with ZDNet this week, Radware said that during the last week of 2020 and the first week of 2021, its customers received a new wave of DDoS extortion emails.Įxtortionists threatened companies with crippling DDoS attacks unless they got paid between 5 and 10 bitcoins ($150,000 to $300,000). Extortion groups that send emails threatening companies with DDoS attacks unless paid a certain fee are making a comeback, security firm Radware warned today.
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