United States and international law enforcement agencies have shut down Genesis Market, a hacker marketplace known for selling compromised credentials and browser fingerprints, some of which were used to steal cryptocurrency.
According to a Tech Crunch reportDubbed “Operation Cookie Monster,” the operation involved the FBI and law enforcement agencies from Poland, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia, Canada, Germany, and Sweden. Approximately 120 people were arrested and 200 searches were carried out around the world.
Since 2017, Genesis Market has been an invitation-only online platform that sold stolen credentials, cookies, and browser fingerprints collected from compromised systems.
These fingerprints, or “bots,” allowed the attackers to impersonate the victims’ browsers and access their online banking and subscription services, such as Amazon and Netflix, bypassing the need for victims’ passwords or two-bit tokens. factors.
The FBI said Genesis Market offered access to data stolen from more than 1.5 million compromised computers worldwide containing more than 80 million account login credentials.
Although overall financial losses have yet to be determined, the FBI reports that Genesis has made at least $8.7 million from the sale of stolen credentials, with total losses likely to exceed tens of millions of dollars.
The Genesis Market shutdown follows a series of similar crackdowns on hacker markets by law enforcement, including the recent shutdown of the hacking forum BreachForums and last year’s shutdown of SSNDOB, a marketplace used to exchange the personal information of millions of Americans.
After the Genesis Market seizure, experts anticipate that sellers and customers may migrate to competing marketplaces or possibly form new versions of the site if a significant core of Genesis Market administrators evade law enforcement.