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DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

justice.gov

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Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#231

Post by PeterisP »

sneak wrote: post #35
shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

It always struck me as improbable that all these high profile (and notoriously hard/impossible to attribute) attacks on “critical infrastructure” or whatever are always instantly and authoritatively pinned (by US authorities) on groups operating in the US’s geopolitical enemies. “Russian hackers” once again, eh?

There are only a few countries which don't extradite cybercriminals to the west and don't prosecute them for foreign attacks - so these few countries are very attractive from which to run such operations; and even for international crime organizations it's good to have the "dirty work" done from such places, where the grunts won't get arrested and be motivated to sell you out for a plea deal.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#232

Post by mrkramer »

blhack wrote: post #150

I think that the people here speculating about the FBI and private keys are greatly overestimating the competency of these hackers. While it's possible this it he FBI flexing some muscle that they have a backdoor into bitcoin's hashing algorithm, what seems much more likely (to me) is: There is a more sophisticated hacking group which created this particular ransomware package. They sell this ransomware package to le…

They seized private key and if it was encrypted/hashed they cracked it. It could've Bitcoin brain wallet and they cracked the actual ASCII password of the wallet.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#233

Post by mrkramer »

shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

>I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host.

They host their hacking tools and other software close to the victim because if you see your network infrastructure logs linking back to an IP address in Russia or China for example it would immediately rise alarm and suspicion.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#234

Post by pharrington »

shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

Alot of professional criminals are such because they aren't competent enough to make money legally.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#235

Post by bob1029 »

nodesocket wrote: post #37
shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

Also completely baffled how the feds got access to the private key and why an elite Russian hacking group would store their crypto on a US based server. At the same time, the obvious tin foil hat answer of it was the feds who concocked the entire scheme also doesn't add up. If the NSA/CIA was behind it, they would be smart enough to not use a US based server / wallet. That makes the story inconsistent, and brings up…

The implausibility of all these scenarios is making me increasingly nervous regarding the other possible ones.

If SHA256 and asymmetric crypto are compromised to this extent, we have a far bigger problem to worry about.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#236

Post by tapland »

erentz wrote: post #154
blhack wrote: post #150

I think that the people here speculating about the FBI and private keys are greatly overestimating the competency of these hackers. While it's possible this it he FBI flexing some muscle that they have a backdoor into bitcoin's hashing algorithm, what seems much more likely (to me) is: There is a more sophisticated hacking group which created this particular ransomware package. They sell this ransomware package to le…

I mean we know the hack wasn’t sophisticated at all. It seems to me the hackers are opportunists, scanning for vulnerabilities and weak VPNs. People are confusing grunt work with sophistication. They would’ve used ransomware against any target that they breached that they thought could pay. Too young or too stupid to think through the consequences. Thread below indicates what happened is they were incredibly naive an…

They use affiliate systems and provide ransomware (that someone else has probably delivered) to the people actually doing the breaches.

It wasn't darkside planting the ransomware afaik, but it was someone wanting to get paid through their affiliate program.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#237

Post by fkfowl3 »

wyager wrote: post #152
blhack wrote: post #150

I think that the people here speculating about the FBI and private keys are greatly overestimating the competency of these hackers. While it's possible this it he FBI flexing some muscle that they have a backdoor into bitcoin's hashing algorithm, what seems much more likely (to me) is: There is a more sophisticated hacking group which created this particular ransomware package. They sell this ransomware package to le…

If the FBI has broke any of Secp256k1, SHA256, or RIPE160, (they have not) they’re not going to blow that on a $3M haul.

They just mention they had access to the private key of the account so that makes sense how they got access. If FBI has broken SHA256, then Bitcoin is a done deal. I hope they share how they got access to the private key.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#238

Post by lordnacho »

t0mbstone wrote: post #156
shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

The reason why this story doesn't make sense is because it's most likely a lie. Think about it for a second. If they wanted to discourage copycat criminals, the easiest way to do it would be to claim they seized the crypto, right? But what proof do we have that the feds actually seized anything? Is the bitcoin transaction publicly listed anywhere where we can audit what happened? And even if you see the coins were mo…

> And even if you see the coins were moved, how do we know it was actually the feds that moved them and not the actual criminals?

If the feds falsely claimed to have done it, the criminals could embarrass them by moving the coins again.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#239

Post by himinlomax »

shiado wrote: post #24

This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…

Computer security is hard. That's why ransomware attacks exist. It's just as hard for ransomware attackers as for their victims. If they were good at computer security, they'd be working a legitimate job. I find your incredulity strange, it's like hearing about the Valentine's day massacre and being shocked that mobsters could be at the receiving end of a Thompson for once.

Re: DOJ seizes $2.3M in cryptocurrency paid to the ransomware extortionists Darkside

#240

Post by avhwl »

blhack wrote: post #150

I think that the people here speculating about the FBI and private keys are greatly overestimating the competency of these hackers. While it's possible this it he FBI flexing some muscle that they have a backdoor into bitcoin's hashing algorithm, what seems much more likely (to me) is: There is a more sophisticated hacking group which created this particular ransomware package. They sell this ransomware package to le…

A "backdoor in bitcoin's hashing algorithm" would not help them recover a private key. "bitcoin's hashing algorithm" is, for PoW, SHA256. The only relevant break for PoW would be a break in preimage resistance; this would allow the attacker to mine blocks faster, which does not allow them to calculate private keys. They could use that to mine an alternate history where the ransomware attack did not occur, but that would of course be immediately obvious.

Preimage attacks tend to be much more rare than collision attacks. MD5 for example still has no publicly known practical preimage attacks.

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