Threat actors’ use of data extortion is nothing new. Forcing ransom payments is known as Big Game Hunting (BGH). However, if the threat fails and the victim does not pay, the data may be released to a third party, generally a rival – a double ransomware extortion. You can visit us for your التحقيق الجنائي الرقمي issues.
Hunting for large game and dealing with ransomware
In2008, programmes began to surface that presented users with fictitious security warnings and demanded money to “clean up” virus infestations that had already been done. Until credit card companies started cracking down on fraudulent transactions, payments were done using credit cards. Once a payment was paid, the screen locker would unlock the device and let the victim back in. Most of these approaches claimed to have proof that a person had seen pornography or had encrypted their data. By 2016, ransomware was mostly aimed at corporations, allowing them to demand larger one-time payments instead of a large number of smaller ones Everything can be researched in سايبر سيكورتي.
These methods are not brand new.
There are a number of different types of cyber extortion, including e-mail extortion, distributed denial of service extortion, and data extortion assaults.
In the world of cyber extortion, email extortion is one of the most common and well-established methods of obtaining ransom. Simply because exposed passwords or contact information are all a threat actor needs. Once they’ve obtained some real personal information, these perpetrators will send an email to the victim claiming the victim has been afflicted with malware. The actor then demands a ransom payment from the victim’s friends, family, and coworkers in order to prevent the information from being distributed to them. DDoS extortion is a newer, more advanced variation of this tactic. Businesses began receiving emails in 2014 warning that if they failed to pay a requested ransom, they would be subjected to a DDoS assault that would shut down their services. Some went so far as to start a DDoS assault in advance of the warning to demonstrate their tenacity, but for the most part, the threat was sufficient.
As a result of ransomware, business networks were infected and their data was stolen. As an alternative, the actor offers to “sell back” the stolen data to the individual victims, threatening to pass it on to third parties if the victim refuses to pay.
Ransomware is a kind of online extortion.
Because organisations began recovering from backups rather than paying a ransom, threat actors had to pick up their game by releasing hacked data.
In May of this year, CrowdStrike Intelligence identified an image maintained by the criminals to communicate with their victims on the Tor hidden service. This supposedly held private and confidential data that had been stolen from a network. Once the ransom was paid, they threatened to delete all the data they’d obtained from the victim’s computer. Despite the fact that it was a failure, this was the first time data extortion was used to encourage ransom payments. More threat actors leaked data to ‘incentivize’ ransom payments, increasing their chances of success.