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US offers $10m reward for intel on DarkSide ransomware gang
Friday, November 5, 2021
The US Department of State has upped the ante in the Biden administration’s ongoing battle against ransomware operators, announcing a reward of up to $10m (£7.4/€8.7m) for information leading to the identification and/or location of key members of the DarkSide syndicate.
But ImmuniWeb’s Ilia Kolochenko said the State Department was making a smart move. “Many sophisticated threat actors use multi-layered anonymisation techniques that undermine all efforts to identify them by technical or scientific means,” he said. “Moreover, forensic procedures can be prohibitively expensive for underfunded law enforcement agencies.
“Nonetheless, cyber criminals are all humans. They are prone to the same human weaknesses as everybody else. They may accidentally disclose their illicit activities to friends or boast about hacking. Finally, rival hacking groups may know each other in person and perfidiously report their competitors to earn money and increase their market monopoly,” said Kolochenko.
“Therefore, starting a bug bounty to unmask cyber criminals is a great and long-awaited idea that will likely bring fruitful results. The process should be systemised and implemented in other countries as well.” Read Full Article
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