Ransomware is booming as a business model: "It's like eBay"
CBSN
The recent ransomware attack on Colonial Pipeline that crippled fuel supplies to 50 million Americans highlights the vulnerability of the country's energy infrastructure to hackers. It also shines light on an emerging business trend in the depths of the dark web where criminal gangs brazenly sell their expertise in computerized mayhem to the highest bidder.
"It is a marketplace that involves services, products and goods. It's like eBay," Mark Arena, CEO of the cybercrime intelligence firm Intel471, told CBS News. Cybersecurity experts say "ransomware-as-a-service" — it even has the acronym RaaS — is a now business model in which criminal groups like DarkSide, the organization believed to be behind the Colonial Pipeline attack, sell or rent their hacking software or services to those who want to carry out cyberattacks to extort victims.
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