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International law enforcement initiative Operation Endgame has delivered “a direct blow to the ransomware kill chain”.
A major law enforcement operation has taken down around 300 servers, disrupted 650 domains and issued arrest warrants for 20 cyber criminals, all as part of the ongoing Operation Endgame.
Europol, which led the operation alongside Eurojust, called the operation a “a direct blow to the ransomware kill chain”, and also revealed it had seized €3.5 million in cryptocurrency, taking the total funds seized during Operation Endgame to €21.2 million.
“This new phase demonstrates law enforcement’s ability to adapt and strike again, even as cyber criminals retool and reorganise,” Catherine De Bolle, Europol executive director, said in a 23 May statement.
“By disrupting the services criminals rely on to deploy ransomware, we are breaking the kill chain at its source.”
This latest step of the campaign focused on taking down initial access malware, the tools used by ransomware operators to gain access to networks before deploying their ransomware. The following strains of malware were neutralised during the operation:
In addition, all the arrest warrants were for initial access brokers, hackers who compromise networks and then sell that access to ransomware operators to exploit. Eighteen of these individuals have been added to the EU’s Most Wanted list.
The emails of more than 15 million victims were also shared with Have I Been Pwned.
The entities targeted in this most recent phase of Operation Endgame emerged in the wake of a wave of takedowns conducted in May 2024.
Operation Endgame is an ongoing, long-term effort to fight cyber crime. This phase was run from Europol headquarters in The Hague, assisted by agencies from Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States.
David Hollingworth has been writing about technology for over 20 years, and has worked for a range of print and online titles in his career. He is enjoying getting to grips with cyber security, especially when it lets him talk about Lego.
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