Posted on 06/07/2021 5:24:17 PM PDT by dennisw
, The U.S. recovered almost all the Bitcoin ransom paid to the perpetrators of the cyber attack on Colonial Pipeline Co. last month in a sign that law enforcement is capable of pursuing online criminals even when they operate outside the nation’s borders.
U.S. officials said Monday that they captured about 63.7 Bitcoin traced to recipients of a 75-Bitcoin ransom paid by Colonial soon after the early May attack that resulted in a shutdown of the nation’s largest gas pipeline, resulting in fuel shortages across the east coast just ahead of the Memorial Day weekend.
Because of the declining value of Bitcoin since the ransom was paid, the U.S. seizure in late May amounted to $2.3 million, just over half the $4.4 million paid weeks earlier after the ransom was demanded.
Deputy FBI Director Paul Abbate said at a Justice Department briefing announcing the seizure that law enforcement identified a virtual wallet used in the ransom payment and then recovered the funds. He said investigators found more than 90 companies victimized by DarkSide, a Russia-linked cybercrime group blamed in the pipeline attack.
“Today we turned the tables on DarkSide,” Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said, as she called on companies to invest more to protect their critical infrastructure and intellectual property. “DarkSide and its affiliates have been digitally stalking U.S. companies for the better part of last year.”
How a Key U.S. Pipeline Got Knocked Out by Hackers: QuickTake
The action signals U.S. law enforcement’s ability, in some cases at least, to track cryptocurrency, identify digital wallets and seize funds, a potentially powerful tool in combating ransomware attacks in particular. The operation also reveals how quickly hacking operations can be identified by the FBI, which Abbate said has been investigating DarkSide since last year.
(Excerpt) Read more at chron.com ...
Hopefully this is a true account, not the Biden administration BSing us.
This was a high profile case. The feds want to look good for the media.
A lot of other smaller companies are getting malware extorsion threats and they’re doing nothing. I know someone with a much smaller company that called the FBI a few times and was never even called them back. A lot of companies are being attacked. Now if the FBI had heard Trump said something bad, they would have been all over it.
The feds have failed us badly. They’re political hacks instead of doing the job to protect the American people.
So, Bitcoin isn’t quite as free from the tentacles of the Leviathon as hoped.
Appears that the Fed’s went to the clearing house and pressured them under the RICO Act would be my best guess.
BTC is part and parcel of the Leviathon. We’re in the middle of the few months of taking down, piece by piece, the deep state, and its fiat currencies (FED) and its cryptos (BTC).
We don’t know that, because we don’t know where they got the keys.
That’s pretty close to that standard 10% for the “Big Guy”.
The US Government has No Such Agency that could access those keys... roflol
How did they recover the ransom? It was said the perps were Russian and highly suspected of being in league with the Russian government Did Putin do a good deed leading into the Biden/Putin meeting next week to set up some deal??
“A lot of other smaller companies are getting malware extorsion threats and they’re doing nothing.”
Being in the MSSP field, we are absolutely astonished at how foolish some organizations are.
L
What other entity’s beside DarkSide has the initials of DS?
This is not the first time the FEDS have traced bitcoin payments.
Oct 2019
IRS Followed Bitcoin Transactions, Resulting In Takedown Of The Largest Child Exploitation Site On The Web
That’s what I get for not proof reading. Let me try it again:
What other entity besides DarkSide has the initials of DS?
Oct 2019 info
The complaint alleges that law enforcement was able to trace payments of bitcoin to the Darknet site by following the flow of funds on the blockchain.
Something interesting I found related to this...
https://www.elliptic.co/blog/elliptic-follows-bitcoin-ransoms-paid-by-darkside-ransomware-victims
—> that law enforcement identified a virtual wallet used in the ransom payment and then recovered the funds.
You should see how fast the Gov’t can seize a regular bank account!
It’s so strange that the country was held hostage for 75 anything.
So the guys who hacked the biggest pipelines on the east coast—people who understand programming and covering your trail digitally…they left their bitcoins on a Coinbase Wallet?
And this on the day after El Salvador tossed the USD under the bus.
As the “Church Lady” used to say…”How convenient,”
When will our government stop lying to our faces?
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