With attacks on organisations beginning earlier this month, DarkSide is the latest ransomware operation to emerge. Having announced themselves through a ‘press release’, as revealed in BleepingComputer, this ransomware has already garnered million-dollar payouts for their attacks. The threat actors have allegedly worked with other ransomware operations making millions of dollars. However, this new product was supposedly created to address their unmet needs.
They wrote:
“We are a new product on the market, but that does not mean that we have no experience and we came from nowhere. We received millions of dollars profit by partnering with other well-known cryptolockers. We created DarkSide because we didn’t find the perfect product for us. Now we have it.”
Moreover, they appear to be guided by some moral principles, specifying that they will not attack certain sectors – including medicine, education, non-profit and the government. Rather, they conduct research into each organisation’s accounts to ensure that they have the means to pay the ransom.
