14 DAY TRIAL // Many cybercriminals are probably nervous after an unidentified group of hackers managed to compromise a credit card payment processor used in illegal operations and leaked detailed information about its customers.
According to researchers from Trend Micro, who looked into the breach, the compromised company was known for having ties to the cybercriminal world.
It was regularly used for payment processing by FAKEAV schemes, pharma spam, unconventional adult-oriented websites, warez and other illegal operations.
However, the company also had legitimate customers, many of which of Russian nationality, who's details are now circulating on underground forums.
The hackers are even said to have lifted employee email and voice communications from a compromised server.
"A particular recorded conversation discussed the various ways of defrauding major credit card companies.
"Another conversation discussed Fethard, a payment service that allows anonymous payments to be made and that is often associated with money laundering and other cybercriminal activities," Feike Hacquebord, advanced threats researcher at Trend, notes.
One of Fethard's owners, which is suspected of having had strong ties with the crutop.nu underground forum, is also said to be one of the people behind the now compromised credit card processing company.
The firm is officially headquartered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, but according to researchers only a handful of employees are actually based there, the bulk of the operation being handled in Russia and Latvia.
"This hacking incident would probably make a lot of cybercriminals nervous. Unfortunately, the incident also puts the personal data of legitimate customers and of many ordinary Russians at risk," the Trend Micro researcher, concludes.