Facebook of cybercrime shut down

Posted on 18/01/2010 by Rich Adams
DarkMarket, Facebook

It will come as no surprise that cyber crime is a serious and growing problem. Where once the name of the game was simply chaos and bragging rights, a new breed of financially motivated hacker has emerged.

Using sophisticated programs and techniques, these criminals steal information from networks and databases around the world. What may come as a suprise, however, is how openly many of them operate. This comes after a group in the UK were recently exposed for running a website where data fraudsters could buy and sell stolen information freely.

They ran the DarkMarket website from an anonymous looking internet café in Wembley, North West London. The site had around 2000 vendors who traded everything from card details (obtained through hacking, phishing and ATM skimming devices) to viruses – with which to extort money from organisations.

Run like an ordinary website, it had administrators and moderators. Reviewers could even voice their opinions regarding ‘customer satisfaction.’ It even featured breaking-news-style updates on the latest compromised material available, while criminals could buy banner adverts to promote their wares.

One might think that such a blatant disregard for the law could be easily dispatched, but it took the joint efforts of both the FBI and our very own SOCA (Serious Organised Crime Agency) to finally bring DarkMarket down.

Ex Pizza Hut worker Renukanth Subramaniam, 33, was today revealed is its founder, and was due to stand trial before pleading guilty last week. He is currently awaiting sentence. Here's a look at what his DarMarket site could supply:

Dumps: data from magnetic stripes on batches of 10 cards. Standard cards: $50. Gold/platinum: $80. Corporate: $180.
Card verification values: information needed for online transactions. $3-$10 depending on quality.
Full information/change of billing:  $150 for account with $10,000 balance. $300 for one with $20,000 balance.
Skimmer: device to read card data. Up to $7,000.
Bank logins: 2% of available balance.
Hire of botnet: software robots used in spam attacks. $50 a day.
Credit card images: both sides of card. $30 each.
Embossed card blanks: $50 each. 
Card holograms: $5 per 100.