Kidnappers in France target cryptocurrency entrepreneurs for ransom


French police rescued the father of a wealthy cryptocurrency entrepreneur in a nighttime raid after he was taken hostage for ransom, the latest alleged criminal effort in France to extort people involved in the management of digital assets.

The man was kidnapped Thursday morning in Paris, the prosecutor’s office said Sunday. “The victim turned out to be the father of a man who made his fortune in cryptocurrencies, and the incident was accompanied by a ransom demand,” its statement said, without giving their names or other specifics about their identities. Police investigators located the hostage in a house in the Essonne region south of Paris, from which he was rescued on Saturday night, the prosecutor’s office said.

Read more…
Source: AP News


Sign up for our Newsletter
The latest news and insights delivered right to your inbox.


Related:

  • APT trends report Q1 2021

    April 27, 2021

    For four years, the Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) at Kaspersky has been publishing quarterly summaries of advanced persistent threat (APT) activity. The summaries are based on our threat intelligence research and provide a representative snapshot of what we have published and discussed in greater detail in our private APT reports. They are designed ...

  • Hello Ransomware Uses Updated China Chopper Web Shell, SharePoint Vulnerability

    April 27, 2021

    In January, Trend Micro researchers encountered a new ransomware using .hello as its extension in one of our cases that possibly arrived via a SharePoint server vulnerability. This appeared to be a new ransomware family dubbed as the Hello ransomware (aka WickrMe), named after the chat application that was used to contact the cybercriminals responsible. Previous ...

  • Linux Kernel Bug Opens Door to Wider Cyberattacks

    April 27, 2021

    An information-disclosure security vulnerability has been discovered in the Linux kernel, which can be exploited to expose information in the kernel stack memory of vulnerable devices. Specifically, the bug (CVE-2020-28588) exists in the /proc/pid/syscall functionality of 32-bit ARM devices running Linux, according to Cisco Talos, which discovered the vulnerability. It arises from an improper conversion of ...

  • Flubot Spyware Spreading Through Android Devices

    April 26, 2021

    Android mobile phone users across the U.K. are being targeted by text messages containing a particularly nasty piece of spyware called “Flubot,” according to the country’s National Cyber Security Centre. The malware is delivered to targets through SMS texts and prompts them to install a “missed package delivery” app. Instead, it takes victims to a scam ...

  • DC Police confirms cyberattack after ransomware gang leaks data

    April 26, 2021

    The Metropolitan Police Department has confirmed that they suffered a cyberattack after the Babuk ransomware gang leaked screenshots of stolen data. The Metropolitan Police Department, also known as the DC Police or MPD, is the primary law enforcement agency for Washington, DC, the US capital. In a statement to BleepingComputer, the DC Police stated that they are ...

  • Nvidia Warns About Severe Security Bugs in GPU Driver, vGPU Software

    April 26, 2021

    Nvidia has disclosed a group of security vulnerabilities in the Nvidia graphics processing unit (GPU) display driver, which could subject gamers and others to privilege-escalation attacks, arbitrary code execution, denial of service (DoS) and information disclosure. Meanwhile, the Nvidia virtual GPU (vGPU) software also has a group of bugs that could lead to a range of ...