Hackers Charged for Creating 6K Strong Cryptojacking Network
Five individuals were caught by the Korean National Police Agency Cyber Bureau after infiltrating and compromising more than 6,000 computers and using them to surreptitiously mine for Monero (XMR) cryptocurrency, reports CCN.
Most bad actors use cryptojacking to mine for Monero because it comes with an anonymous blockchain and it can also easily be mined using computing systems with minimal resources, unlike Bitcoin which needs quite powerful mining rigs with modern GPUs for reasonable performance.
The hacking group used the emails of 32,435 job applicants and human resource personnel from multiple forums and recruitment platforms, targeting them using malicious emails containing malware disguised as legitimate resumes and recruitment letters. Moreover, the victims' computers were infected after opening the malicious attachments, with the cryptocurrency mining payload automatically starting working in the background.
