213/68 Friday, June 13, 2025
INTERPOL, in collaboration with law enforcement agencies from 26 countries, has successfully dismantled a major cybercrime syndicate operating across the Asia-Pacific region under Operation Secure. The coordinated effort led to the arrest of 32 suspects in Vietnam, Sri Lanka, and Nauru, along with the seizure of 117 Command-and-Control (C2) servers and over 100 gigabytes of forensic evidence. Authorities also managed to disrupt 79% of the criminal infrastructure tied to the operation, based on the over 20,000 suspicious IP addresses identified.
The operation was supported by private sector partners including Group-IB, Kaspersky Lab, and Trend Micro, who provided technical expertise and cyber threat analysis.
According to investigators, the cybercriminal network leveraged multiple types of Infostealer malware—notably Lumma, Risepro, and Meta Stealer—to extract sensitive data from victims via phishing, social media scams, and various cyber fraud techniques. The stolen data included browser credentials, cookies, credit card information, and cryptocurrency wallet details.
In Vietnam, police arrested 18 key suspects, including the ringleader, and seized over 300 million Vietnamese dong in cash, along with SIM cards and documents outlining the criminal operation. Additional suspects were apprehended in Sri Lanka and Nauru. Authorities in Hong Kong are currently analyzing the seized evidence for further investigation.
The operation was carried out under the Asia and South Pacific Joint Operations Against Cybercrime (ASPJOC) initiative, which involves member countries including Thailand, Brunei, Cambodia, Fiji, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kiribati, South Korea, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, the Maldives, Nauru, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Samoa, Singapore, the Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Vanuatu, and Vietnam.
INTERPOL emphasized the critical importance of international cooperation, intelligence sharing, and the integration of cybercrime experts to effectively tackle the increasing complexity of cyber threats in the modern era.
Source https://www.darkreading.com/threat-intelligence/infostealer-ring-bust-20000-malicious-ips
