Research shows that cyber thieves are increasingly turning to the deep web to stop police surveillance of cybercriminal transactions on the darknet.
Instead of trading on marketplaces, the researchers said criminals turned to “closed” chat forums, invite-only communities, and encrypted apps.
They warn that the change could make it harder for law enforcement to detect and track attacks. They also found a significant increase in attacks targeting large companies.
Hidden chatter
The study included clandestine researchers in a large number of forums and closed chat forums on the darknet.
The Deep Web (DarkNet) is a part of the Internet that is not accessible to search engines such as Google, and for which people need a special browser to visit. The most famous darknet is accessible through the Tor browser.
Successful police efforts to infiltrate darknet markets, as well as raids that have shut down many of them, have pushed criminals into a more secure way of communicating, ”said Dr. Mike McGuire, University of Surrey criminologist who led the project. …
“It’s not as bright as it used to be because they know that the feds are listening and that they will take over the markets,” he said.
While criminal gangs still operate on these publicly accessible marketplaces, Dr. McGuire said, any talk of goals and tactics is instantly transferred to secure apps like Telegram, or to separate forums and chats.
As part of the study, researchers impersonated customers and asked hackers about the costs of a wide variety of cyber attacks. They researched market rates for specialized malware attacks, phishing campaigns, industrial espionage, and inside information.
Estimated costs included:
remote access to corporate networks $ 2-30 (£ 1.50-24)
targeted attack on a company $ 4500
targeted attack per person $ 2,000
phishing kits $ 40
fake Amazon receipts and invoices $ 52
Espionage and Insider Trading $ 1,000 – $ 15,000
He added that if one group disappears or is dispersed by the police, the other will simply move to fill the gap.
“It’s like chopping off the head of a hydra.”