Washington announced on Wednesday that it has offered a $10 million reward for information on three Iranian hackers accused by the US judiciary of carrying out cyber attacks to collect ransom money. institutions around the world, including a shelter for victims of domestic violence and a hospital.” for children.
According to the indictment published on Wednesday, Mansour Ahmadi (34 years old), Ahmed Khatibi Aghda (45 years old) and Amir Hossein Naqin (30 years old) have carried out a series of cyber attacks against US, British, Israeli and Russian institutions. And also inside Iran.
In the indictment, there is no mention of the connection of these three defendants with the Iranian government, and the FBI emphasizes that the “main” purpose of the defendants in these cyber attacks was their personal enrichment.
However, the US Department of State and Treasury confirmed that the three defendants were part of a group of hackers “linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.”
The two ministries announced in two separate statements that they have sanctioned three defendants in addition to seven other Iranians and two Iranian companies.
The State Department has set a $10 million reward for anyone who helps arrest the three suspects.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said the award “demonstrates our determination to prevent any ransomware cyber attack on our infrastructure.”
A senior official of the US Department of Justice, who asked not to be named, said that the three defendants are probably in Iran.
The three men are accused of targeting hundreds of intelligence networks around the world.
In the United States, their targets included small businesses as well as an electric company, a children’s hospital in Boston, municipalities, and the American Bar Association (ABA).
Each time, these hackers encrypted the data of their victims by exploiting the flaws in the system and asked them to pay thousands of dollars in exchange for a decryption key.
Some of their victims agreed to pay the ransom, including a shelter for abused women in Pennsylvania that paid $13,000 for restitution and non-disclosure.
FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a video message posted on the FBI’s website that the three defendants “conducted hacking, data theft and extortion primarily for personal gain.”
Ray confirmed that the FBI had issued a warning about a “broader threat from cyber activists linked to the Iranian government,” noting that the warning had also been accepted by Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom.
The Iranian regime is often accused of conducting cyber attacks abroad, which it denies.
The Albanian government recently severed ties with Tehran, accusing it of being behind a massive hacking campaign that first targeted its digital infrastructure and then its security services.
Source: Lebanon Debate
