The US State Division on Tuesday provided a $10 million reward for info resulting in the arrest or conviction of a Russian man accused of a 2021 ransomware assault on the Washington, DC, Police Division that led to the leak of delicate police information.
Mikhail Matveev, who was additionally charged with hacking related-crimes and sanctioned on Tuesday, has bragged about his alleged hacking exploits on-line – however the US authorities is outwardly searching for extra particular info that would result in his arrest.
He was charged with damaging computer systems and transmitting ransom calls for in federal grand jury indictments in New Jersey and the District of Columbia.
Matveev has been prolific amongst Russian ransomware gangs that lock up laptop information and demand exorbitant payoffs from US corporations and authorities companies, based on US prosecutors. Three of the forms of ransomware that Matveev allegedly labored with have value victims $200 million in extortion charges, the Justice Division stated.
Requested for remark by CNN on Twitter, Matveev replied with a video with a Russian man repeating the phrase, “I don’t give a f*** in any respect.”
The rapid prospects of Matveev seeing the within of a US courtroom are slim. His response to the fees exemplifies the impunity that Russian hackers really feel in with the ability to assault US organizations from the protection of Russian soil.
The US and Russia don’t have an extradition settlement, and any faint hope of Russian assist in rounding up hacking suspects light .
“Within the present surroundings, there are few causes for Moscow to curb cybercrime emanating from inside its borders, and actually each incentive to tacitly approve or orchestrate the worst they will throw on the West,” stated Gavin Wilde, a former Nationwide Safety Council official centered on Russia.
Matveev lives within the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad and repeatedly visits the Russian metropolis of St. Petersburg, based on Azim Khodjibaev, senior menace analyst at Cisco Talos, who has tracked Matveev for years.
Whereas Matveev hasn’t been shy about claiming accountability for hacks, there isn’t a indication that he would danger arrest by leaving Russia.
Amongst Matveev’s alleged victims was a nonprofit well being care group in New Jersey and a regulation enforcement company in New Jersey. In April 2021, Matveev was concerned in considered one of his most high-profile hacks but: the breach of computer systems on the DC Police Division and a requirement of $4 million to not launch the stolen knowledge.
After the division apparently didn’t meet the demand, the ransomware gang that Matveev allegedly labored with revealed a trove of the stolen police knowledge, which The Related Press reported included police officer disciplinary information and intelligence reviews.
The 2-year investigation into the ransomware assault on the DC Police Division “spanned quite a few continents” and concerned the FBI, stated Metropolitan Police Chief Robert J. Contee III in a press release Tuesday.
Matveev has lengthy been identified for his brash and erratic habits on-line. He surfaced on Twitter final yr and started tweeting about his involvement in ransomware. He circulated a photograph of himself aboard a Russian airline, asking a minimum of one researcher to advertise the picture.
However after sending this CNN reporter a cryptic message in July 2022, Matveev had but to answer a number of questions over a number of months about his alleged hacking actions till the profane video he despatched Tuesday.
“He actually doesn’t have a lot to lose by popping out” together with his public id, Khodjibaev beforehand advised CNN. “So long as these guys have entry to a pc, they don’t have a purpose to cease.”
Matveev has been promoting hacking companies on legal boards way back to 2009, based on cybersecurity agency Intel 471. His flip to ransomware lately opened up extra monetary alternatives but in addition doubtless put him extra firmly on the radar of regulation enforcement and personal investigators.
Matveev’s “profession path” is an instance of the evolution that some cybercriminals make from “low-level, unsophisticated exercise” to rising their “underground notoriety, consideration and repute as they hone their expertise and construct their portfolio,” Michael DeBolt, Intel 471’s chief intelligence officer, advised CNN.
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