Highlights
- As per the report by the Cyber intelligence firm KELA, hacktivist groups that work for political motives benefit from a variety of funding methods.
- The groups that carry out data leaks and DDOS attacks engage in various techniques, including commonly used tactics.
- The firm mentions that Pro Russian hacktivist groups such as Killnet, Anonymous Russia, Anonymous Sudan & Pheonix have attacked organizations with DDOS Botnet.
According to the cyberintelligence firm KELA report, hacktivist groups that work for political motives benefit from a variety of funding methods to carry out their operations.
The firm said that the groups that carry out data leaks and DDOS attacks engage in various techniques, including commonly used tactics.
As we know, these tactics include selling malware & Botnet, asking for ransom from the victims, and providing services such as hack for hire & more.
The cyber intelligence firm mentions that the Russian Pro hacktivists group Killnet promoted a botnet for hire in November 2021. But, the group’s revenue methods increased drastically this year.
The group organized a hack for hire in July and also unveiled a Dark School training scheme to sell nine hacking courses to interested hackers.
In the same month, the group unveiled a cryptocurrency exchange platform as the group got popular on Telegram, charging service rates between 3-4 percent.
Russian group Killnet was seen trying to sell off the data, logs, and access to Telegram networks and their Infinity forums with advertisements.
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That’s not all; the Russian group also tried to extort into paying ransom to delete the stolen data and to end the DDOS attack, as we saw in the case of Rutor last year, BlackSprupt & Lavitian government.
Moving on, KELA, the cyberintelligence firm, said another Pro Russian hacktivist group Anonymous Russia also shared their money-making activities that go further than just politically motivated DDOS attacks that targeted European countries.
Later in the year, the hacktivists group stopped taking donations and instead launched services such as Telsa Botnet malware advertised on its telegram channel. Soon after that, the group also unveiled a DDOS service to target websites on the Tor browser.
According to KELA, Anonymous Sudan is a hacktivist group that has just come out and is said to have a connection with the Killnet. The group also sells stolen data on its Telegram channel as well
Furthermore, Anonymous Sudan tried to sell stolen data that they claimed they have stolen from Air France for a ransom of $3,000 and, at the same time, demanded $3,500 from Scandinavian Airlines to end the attack.
After that, the hacktivist said that they made a DDOS attack on Microsoft and demanded a ransom of $1,000,000 to stop the attack, bringing Microsoft services down. Also, Anonymous Sudan posted an advertisement for the sale of 30 million Microsoft accounts for $50,000.
Lastly, there’s Pheonix, also a Russian hacktivist that was launched as the sub-team for Legion (Russian hacktivist) and soon embraced different revenue techniques, such as selling stolen data on Telegram.
The targets of the hacktivist group were publically extorted on the Telegram group that includes Cellular Pacific.
Moreover, the leader of the hacktivists added that the group offers services for DDOS attacks and has also given personal hacking courses on Telegram and charges up to $2,675.
Later on, the group announced that it would begin video & audio streaming their attacks, granting the highest bidder access to the live stream.
As per the cyber intelligence firm, these groups are monetizing their operations to stay operative to conduct powerful attacks on the target.
Nevertheless, even without their funding, it still does not make them any less dangerous to users & companies, as the consequences of data theft & exposure of sensitive information are far greater.
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