Two males have been indicted within the U.S. for his or her alleged involvement in managing a darkish internet market referred to as WWH Membership that focuses on the sale of delicate private and monetary data.
Alex Khodyrev, a 35-year-old Kazakhstan nationwide, and Pavel Kublitskii, a 37-year-old Russian nationwide, have been charged with conspiracy to commit entry gadget fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
Khodyrev and Kublitskii, between 2014 and 2024, acted as the primary directors of WWH Membership (wwh-club[.]ws) and varied different sister websites – wwh-club[.]web, center-club[.]pw, opencard[.]pw, skynetzone[.]org – that functioned as darkish internet marketplaces, boards, and coaching facilities to allow cybercrime.
The indictment follows an investigation launched by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in July 2020 after figuring out that WWH Membership’s main area (www-club[.]ws] resolved to an IP deal with belonging to DigitalOcean, permitting them to challenge a federal search warrant to the infrastructure firm.
“WWH Membership and sister website members used the marketplaces to purchase and promote stolen private figuring out data (PII), bank card and checking account data, and pc passwords, amongst different delicate data,” the U.S. Division of Justice (DoJ) mentioned.
The boards, however, acted as a hotspot for discussions on finest practices for committing fraud, launching cyber assaults, and evading regulation enforcement.
Moreover, the darknet market supplied on-line programs for aspiring and lively cyber criminals on learn how to conduct frauds. The marketed value of the course ranged from 10,000 rubles to 60,000 rubles (about $110 to $664 as of September 7, 2024) and an extra $200 for coaching supplies.
Court docket paperwork present that undercover FBI brokers signed up for the positioning and attended a coaching course supplied by the platform by paying roughly $1,000 in bitcoin that included subjects such because the sale of delicate data, DDoS and hacking providers, bank card skimmers, and brute-force applications.
“The coaching was performed by means of a chat perform on the discussion board to a category of roughly 50 college students; the assorted instructors offered coaching in textual content format reasonably than audible instruction,” the prison grievance reads. “It was obvious the aim of the coaching was to teach people on learn how to acquire and use stolen bank card information and PII to generate fraudulent proceeds.”
WWH Membership is estimated to have had 353,000 customers worldwide as of March 2023, up from 170,000 registered customers in July 2020. Each Khodyrev and Kublitskii are believed to have profited from the membership charges, tuition charges, and promoting income.
Flashpoint, in a report printed final month, mentioned WWH-Membership stays operational regardless of the regulation enforcement effort, and that “its different directors try to distance themselves from Kublitskii and Khodyrev.”
Khodyrev and Kublitskii “had been residing in Miami for the previous two years, whereas secretly persevering with to manage WWH Membership and its sister darkish internet marketplaces, boards, and colleges,” the DoJ mentioned.
If convicted on all counts, they might every resist 20 years in federal jail. The indictment additionally requires Khodyrev to forfeit his 2023 Mercedes-Benz G63 AMG sport utility car and Kublitskii’s 2020 Cadillac CT5 Sport sedan, that are mentioned to have been bought utilizing proceeds from their prison enterprise.
