Ne’er-Do-Well News

April 14, 2016

‘Blackhole’ Exploit Kit Author Gets 8 Years

This post was originally published on this site A Moscow court this week convicted and sentenced seven hackers for breaking into countless online bank accounts — including “Paunch,” the nickname used by the author of the infamous “Blackhole” exploit kit.  Once an extremely popular crimeware-as-a-service offering, Blackhole was for several years responsible for a large percentage of malware infections and stolen banking credentials, and likely contributed to tens of millions of dollars stolen from small to mid-sized businesses over several years. Fedotov, the convicted creator of the Blackhole Exploit Kit, stands in front of his Porche Cayenne in an undated photo. According […]
April 20, 2016

SpyEye Makers Get 24 Years in Prison

This post was originally published on this site Two hackers convicted of making and selling the infamous SpyEye botnet creation kit were sentenced in Georgia today to a combined 24 years in prison for helping to infect hundreds of thousands of computers with malware and stealing millions from unsuspecting victims. Aleksander Panin developed and sold SpyEye. Image courtesy: RT. Atlanta Judge Amy Totenberg handed down a sentence of nine years, six months for Aleksandr Andreevich Panin, a 27-year-old Russian national also known by the hacker aliases “Gribodemon” and “Harderman.” Convicted of conspiracy to commit wire and bank fraud, Panin was the core developer and distributor of SpyEye, a botnet toolkit that […]
May 31, 2016

Got $90,000? A Windows 0-Day Could Be Yours

This post was originally published on this siteHow much would a cybercriminal, nation state or organized crime group pay for blueprints on how to exploit a serious, currently undocumented, unpatched vulnerability in all versions of Microsoft Windows? That price probably depends on the power of the exploit and what the market will bear at the time, but here’s a look at one convincing recent exploit sales thread from the cybercrime underworld where the current asking price for a Windows-wide bug that allegedly defeats all of Microsoft’s current security defenses is USD $90,000. So-called “zero-day” vulnerabilities are flaws in software and hardware that even […]
June 1, 2016

Mir Islam – the Guy the Govt Says Swatted My Home – to be Sentenced June 22

This post was originally published on this siteOn March 14, 2013 our humble home in Annandale, Va. was “swatted” — that is to say, surrounded by a heavily-armed police force that was responding to fraudulent reports of a hostage situation at our residence. Later this month the government will sentence 21-year-old hacker named Mir Islam for that stunt and for leading a criminal conspiracy allegedly engaged in a pattern of swatting, identity theft and wire fraud. Mir Isam Mir Islam briefly rose to Internet infamy as one of the core members of UGNazi, an online mischief-making group that claimed credit for hacking […]