Cybercriminals are taking sides over Russia's deadly invasion of Ukraine, putting either the West or Moscow in their sights, according to Accenture.
The consultancy giant's Cyber Threat Intelligence team, which tracks illicit dark-web activity, said in a report [PDF] dated Monday that this is the first time it has witnessed "financially motivated threat actors divided along ideological factions."
These crooks, who typically act opportunistically to extort large sums of money from victims via ransomware, are either backing or opposing President Putin's war on Ukraine, and selecting their targets along those lines, we're told.
"Pro-Ukrainian actors are refusing to sell, buy, or collaborate with Russian-aligned actors and are increasingly attempting to target Russian entities in support of Ukraine," Accenture claimed.
"However, pro-Russian actors are increasingly aligning with hacktivist-like activity targeting 'enemies of Russia,' especially Western entities due to their claims of Western warmongering."
Some of these gangs are selling access to compromised networks, and other nefarious services, exclusively to Kremlin-linked miscreants and sympathetic entities, we're told. Related to that, specific sectors in the West face a higher risk of attack. "The targeting of financial and insurance entities is due to the perception that they are the working arms of Western financial sanctions, whereas the targeting of utilities and resources entities is due to those organizations' importance as critical national infrastructure," according to Accenture.
These political divides played out in the Conti leak. After the notorious ransomware group announced its unwavering support for President Vladimir Putin and his occupation of Ukraine, plus its intent to use "all possible resources to strike back" should anyone launch a cyberattack against Russia, the crew suffered a
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