12 years since it started operations, the suspected administrator of XSS.is, formerly called DaMaGeLaB, has been arrested by Europol in an operation led by the French Police and Paris Prosecutor in Kyiv. Authorities have also seized XSS’s clearnet domain and taken the website out of commission.
The investigation was first initiated by the French police in 2021. In September 2024, the case moved into its operational phase in Ukraine, where French police investigators were deployed on the ground, supported by Ukrainian law enforcement and Europol. The arrest finally took place on July 22.
Europol’s announcement claims XSS is “one of the world’s most influential Russian-speaking cybercrime platforms.” The forum had more than 50,000 registered users and served as a popular marketplace for stolen data, hacking tools, and other illicit services. The forum has also been used by some of the most “active and dangerous cybercriminal networks” to coordinate attacks, advertise services, and recruit hackers.
The forum’s administrator is also believed to have run thesecure.biz, a private messaging platform built specifically for cybercriminals. This individual is being held responsible for not only handling the technical operations of XSS but also for enabling criminal activity by acting as a third party overseeing disputes between criminals and guaranteeing transaction security.
Investigators believe he has been active in the cybercrime ecosystem for nearly two decades and had close ties to several major threat actors. His illegal digital enterprises are estimated to have made €7 million ($8.24 million) in profits via advertising and facilitation fees alone.
The arrest comes just a couple of weeks after another Europol-led operation disrupted online infrastructure belonging to pro-Russian hacktivist group NoName057(16). This operation also led to the arrest of two individuals for carrying out DDoS attacks against Ukraine and its allies using a Go-based tool called DDoSia.
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