The recently formed hacktivist collective called Five Families announced one of their targeted websites. The group claimed to have launched a cyber attack on Alpha Automation and Robotics Ltd. based in Brazil. The alleged Alpha Automation cyber attack remained unconfirmed by the company.
The website running in the Portuguese language was accessible at the time of publishing this report when checked by The Cyber Express.
However, we did receive an alert while accessing the website that it has been targeted with phishing attacks.
Five Families Collective Announce the Alpha Automation Cyber Attack
The hacker collective said that they exfiltrated nearly 230 GB of data through the Alpha Automation cyber attack. Drawing attention to the heist the hackers wrote, “A Brazilian company, Alfacommercial.com.br, has been successfully and easily breached by your favorite organized crime families.”
They stole the company data from its cloud storage and encrypted the server which was used to manage the company storage system (RAID).
They threatened that the required data exfiltrated during the Alpha Automation cyber attack would be filtered which included information about the customers. It also included financial information, internal documents, and company software data among other documents.
Five Families placed their session ID on their dark web portal for negotiations to stop publicly releasing the exfiltrated data from the Alpha Automation ransomware attack.
The newly formed hacker collective also invited other buyers of the data if the company declined to pay a ransom.
Efforts to Launch Organized Crime
The Five Families were formed with the joining of hacker groups, hacktivists, and a dark web forum called Blackforums.
Referring to the Blackforums, the hacker collective noted, “Additionally, you can reach out to us for data purchases through our forum, Blackforums; we are always active on there and will be reading any messages.”
The joining together of the groups namely ThreatSec, GhostSec, Stormous, BlackForums, and SiegedSec would make it convenient for them to align cyberattacks according to their available tools and resources and then market their actions on the Blackforums.
After the closing of the dark web forum – BreachForums and the several updates made by other users to revive it, the future of the dark web marketplaces seemed dim to its users. After the arrest of Pompompurin, the administrator of BreachForums, Baphomet tried taking the role of the administrator.
However, they failed and the forum remained defunct. Now, with BlackForums and the likes, hackers are trying their level best to stay in the limelight on the dark web. The 19-year-old Conor Fitzpatrick or Pompompurin also made headlines when he attempted suicide after being arrested for his cybercrimes.
With the announcement of the Five Families collaborating reaching the media yesterday and their cyber attack claims cropping the next day, it seems the hacker collective has data ready about their next targets with vulnerabilities and phishing campaigns lined up to be exploited.
The group did not mention the cause of naming the website of the company in Brazil. It remains to be seen whom they target in the future and for what cause as most of the Five Families claim to be hacktivists.
Hackers from the groups ThreatSec, and GhostSec have often launched cyber attacks on websites citing social injustice as the cause. Stormous often claimed to target organizations with weaker security as seen to be mentioned in the Alpha Automation cyber attack post made by Five Families.
Media Disclaimer: This report is based on internal and external research obtained through various means. The information provided is for reference purposes only, and users bear full responsibility for their reliance on it. The Cyber Express assumes no liability for the accuracy or consequences of using this information.