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Alleged GandCrab Distributor Arrested in Belarus:

A 31-year-old man who allegedly distributed versions of the GandCrab ransomware has been arrested in Belarus for possession and distribution of malware, according to the country's Ministry of Internal Affairs.

On July 30, government officials in Belarus announced that the unnamed suspect, who lives in the city of Gomel, was arrested by police in cooperation with the authorities from the U.K. and Romania. GandCrab ransomware was pulled from distribution by its creators in 2019 (see: Did GandCrab Gang Fake Its Ransomware Retirement?).

Officials in Belarus note that the suspect also appears to have also been distributing cryptominers and programming malicious codes for illegal forums. The suspect apparently obtained a strain of the Gancrab ransomware by joining a darknet forum and then learned how to operate as a GandCrab affiliate, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The creator of the GandCrab malware offered it to others using a ransomware-as-a-service model.

Once the suspect obtained the malware, he sent malicious PDF files through spam emails to victims to infect their system, authorities allege. The suspect charged a fee of about $1,200 in cryptocurrency to decrypt each of the infected systems, the ministry says. The suspect leased servers to conduct his operation and used the ransomware profits to pay for the facilities, it alleges.

The hacker allegedly targeted victims in more than 100 countries, including the U.S., U.K. India, Germany, France, Italy and Russia, says Vladimir Zaitsev, the deputy head of the high-tech crimes department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

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