Russian Police Shut Down Four Hacker Sites, Including Ferum and Trump’s Dumps

This week, Russian law enforcement authorities blocked several major hacker resources, including the carding platforms Ferum and Trump’s Dumps, the RDP shop Uas-Service, and the forum Sky-Fraud. All of these sites were Russian-language and operated by Russian-speaking administrators.

The main pages of these sites now display notices stating that the “resource is permanently closed as a result of a law enforcement operation.” Additionally, the HTML code of the sites included the message: “Who’s next?”

According to experts from Flashpoint, the operation was organized by the “K” Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. At the same time, the TASS news agency reported that six Russian citizens have been charged with “illegal circulation of payment means,” and law enforcement has dismantled the third hacker group since the beginning of the year.

“According to the investigation, the detainees possess specialized knowledge in the field of international payment systems and are suspected of committing crimes involving computer technology and information and communication networks,” a source told the agency.

Analytical company Elliptic reported that the aforementioned sites collectively “earned” over $263,000,000 in cryptocurrency. Ferum alone, active since October 2013, brought in more than $256,000,000 in Bitcoin from the sale of stolen cards—almost 17% of the entire stolen card market.

The popular Uas-Service, which sold compromised Social Security Numbers (SSNs) and access to RDP servers since November 2017, generated about $3,000,000 in cryptocurrency. Another carding shop, Trump’s Dumps, earned around $4,100,000 since October 2017.

Experts from Group-IB told RBC journalists that, over their lifespans, these now-closed resources sold data on more than 113,000,000 bank cards, with a total value exceeding $654,900,000.

“The carding market is becoming less attractive for cybercriminals: its volume has been shrinking since last year. Card shops will divide clients and suppliers among themselves, but it’s already clear that carding is gradually fading away. The shutdown of three of the oldest card shops is a clear signal to carders worldwide,” commented Group-IB co-founder and CEO Dmitry Volkov.