Summary

The US State Department said in a Press Release on 4^th Nov 2021 that they are offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the identification or location of anyone with a key leadership position in DarkSide, a cybercrime organization the FBI has said is based in Russia.

They also state “The Department is also offering a reward offer of up to $5,000,000 for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction in any country of any individual conspiring to participate in or attempting to participate in a Dark Side variant ransomware incident.”

DarkSide Ransomware group was responsible for the May 2021 Colonial Pipeline Company ransomware incident, which caused temporarily shut down the 5,500-mile pipeline that carries 45 percent of the fuel used on the East Coast of the United States that led to spike in gas prices, panic buying and localized fuel shortages in the US.

Colonial pipeline had nearly paid the hackers $5 Million ransom which $2.3 Million was recovered by US Justice Department. This is not the first time that the US government has offered bounty for information on APT groups. On July 2021 has the US government offered a $10 million reward on information that can identify and locate threat actors

With the threats received from the white house DarkSide gang week after stated that they lost control over servers and some of their funds from a mysterious cyberattack and shut down its operations. Then in July they came back rebranding itself as BlackMatter. But few weeks earlier the group shut down its operations for a second time due to some member disappearing and cause of the pressure from authorities.

Reference

• https://www.state.gov/reward-offers-for-information-to-bring-darkside-ransomware-variant-co-conspirators-to-justice/
• https://therecord.media/us-offers-10-million-reward-for-info-on-darkside-ransomware-group/