"AT&T. Ticketmaster. Santander Bank. Neiman Marcus. Electronic Arts. These were not entirely isolated incidents. Instead, they were all hacked thanks to “infostealers,” a type of malware that is designed to pillage passwords and cookies stored in the victim’s browser. In turn, infostealers have given birth to a complex ecosystem that has been allowed to grow in the shadows and where criminals fulfill different roles. There are Russian malware coders continually updating their code; teams of professionals who use glitzy advertising to hire contractors to spread the malware across YouTube, TikTok, or GitHub; and English-speaking teenagers on the other side of the world who then use the harvested credentials to break into corporations. At the end of October, a collaboration of law enforcement agencies announced an operation against two of the world’s most prevalent stealers. But the market has been able to grow and mature so much that now law enforcement action against even one part of it is unlikely to make any lasting dent in the spread of infostealers.

Based on interviews with malware developers, hackers who use the stolen credentials, and a review of manuals that tell new recruits how to spread the malware, 404 Media has mapped out this industry. Its end result is that a download of an innocent-looking piece of software by a single person can lead to a data breach at a multibillion-dollar company, putting Google and other tech giants in an ever-escalating cat-and-mouse game with the malware developers to keep people and companies safe."

https://www.wired.com/story/inside-the-massive-crime-industry-thats-hacking-billion-dollar-companies/

#CyberSecurity #CyberCrime #Hacking #Malware #InfoStealers #DataBreaches