The operation was sponsored and supervised by Europol, which claims the apprehended individuals are notorious for their outlandish ransom demands ranging from €5 million to €70 million.
Europol, which says the arrested suspects are known for their outrageous ransom demands ranging from €5 million to €70 million, supported and coordinated the operation.
The arrested suspects, whose names have been concealed, are claimed to have plotted a series of organized crimes targeting significant organizations and industrial groups in Europe and North America beginning in April 2020. Europol reports that the individuals are known to always grab sensitive data from their perpetrators, which is then encrypted until the desired ransom is paid.
“The criminals would deploy malware and steal sensitive data from these companies before encrypting their files,” according to the announcement, adding that “they would then proceed to offer a decryption key in exchange for a ransom payment of several million euros, threatening to leak the stolen data on the dark web if their demands were not met.”
The coordinated action by numerous law enforcement authorities resulted in the seizure of US$375,000 in cash, the seizure of two luxury vehicles worth €217,000, and the freezing of $1.3 million in cryptocurrencies.
The bulk of people involved in Ransomware assaults are known to demand payment in cryptocurrency, which fosters pessimism about implementing progressive crypto rules amongst various monetary watchdogs today.
Developing an effective cross-border monitoring system to bring ransomware criminals to justice is a surefire method to accelerate the use of digital currencies across several jurisdictions. The reasoning is straightforward, and it is based on the belief that, despite the remarkable anonymity of digital currency transactions, criminal activities can still be traced.
Over the last year, the US government has made significant investments in bitcoin tracing technologies and systems to assist in the capture of ransomware attackers. The American government announced its first crypto-ransomware-related sanctions in September, via the US Treasury Department.
With the growing demand for improved digital currency legislation in the United States, the results of these ransomware tracking technologies must be demonstrated to yield significant progress to begin with.
