US Treasury's OFAC has sanctioned seven members of a Russian cybergang known as Trickbot over attacks against critical infrastructure and attempts to exploit the "international financial system."
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OFAC said in a press release on Thursday that the Russia-based cybercrime gang also targeted hospitals and healthcare centers by launching a wave of ransomware attacks in the US. The government believes that the hackers are "associated with Russian Intelligence Services," though it is unclear with what unit of law enforcement the gang is cooperating.
Analysts at Chainalysis, a blockchain forensic firm, found out that the gang made "at least" $724 million worth of cryptocurrency. They added:
"This makes Trickbot the second highest earning cybercrime group, following the North Korean-linked Lazarus group."
Although OFAC did not include any cryptocurrency addresses related to the gang in its sanctions list, Chainalysis identified several of these actors' cryptocurrency wallets.
According to published data, at least several members of the group — Ivan Vakhromeyev (aka Mushroom), Maksim Mikhailov (aka Baget), Valentin Karyagin (aka Globus), and Valery Sedletski (aka Strix) — received payments from the Trickbot administrator also known as Stern.
OFAC also sanctioned three other members of the group: Vitaly Kovalev (aka Bentley or Ben), Mikhail Iskritskiy (aka Tropa) and Dmitry Pleshevskiy (aka Iseldor).
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