back to article Dark web hubs paying workers to leak corporate secrets

Staff are taking to the dark web to leak corporate secrets for cash, research reveals. Hackers from US-based risk management outfit RedOwl and Israeli threat intelligence firm IntSights worked their way past the interview process to access the private dark net property Kick Ass Marketplace, where they found evidence of staff …

  1. a_yank_lurker

    Insiders as a threat

    The worst threat to a company's security has been and still is the insider who has access to the information and can get it out. Adding the dark web just makes some aspects of selling the information easier but does not change the fundamental security problem - disgruntled employees.

    1. Michael Thibault

      Re: Insiders as a threat

      >disgruntled employees

      Probably more accurate to say: insufficiently-gruntled serfs. Everyone has a price, and everything becomes a commodity.

      1. The First Dave

        Re: Insiders as a threat

        Where do I sign up?

    2. Jim Cosser

      Re: Insiders as a threat

      It doesn't change the problem but it likely increases the scope, the ability to monetise financial information without these kind of forums in a safe way is more difficult.

      When it comes to purposefully installing malware it again it removes the requirement to handle the end to end engagement as well as plausible deniability.

      I think it's a significant shift.

  2. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge

    IT is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there are AIMaster Keys

    Yes ..... the problem appears to be that systems and the human being are wired/programmed/predisposed to creating hellish life on Earth rather than heaven existences in space. And whilst that continue to be default policy, will significantly deeper insider threat vectors and zeroday vulnerability exploit opportunity sectors be instituted/magicked into stealthy virtual operation.

    Would that constitute a revolutionary quantum leap and simple complex evolutionary tour de force?

    Progress in deed, indeed, but not as you were expecting it or would know it or would command and control it .....,. and an unknown unknown to oppose and compete against for a mounting toll of stupendous losses.

  3. Pen-y-gors

    Plus ca change...

    So, basically a web-based version of slipping a fiver to a stable-lad to get the hot news on a horse before the big race?

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Haven't execs been doing this for years?

    Exploiting the information and services provided by their businesses for substantial personal gain?

    As much as I loathe people that steal from their employers, I find it tricky to empathise with the corporate overlords.

    Its stinginess that breeds the necessity for this type of crime.

    A person that has enough to live comfortably generally doesn't have the compulsion to improve their comfortable life enough to take a huge risk.

    A person on a zero hour contract earning buttons has to do whatever it takes to survive...after all with zero guaranteed hours what have they got to lose?

    Just because someone will work for peanuts doesnt mean you should pay them peanuts.

  5. mwnci

    Whoa there Horsey!...."Its stinginess that breeds the necessity for this type of crime." It's a fine line between understanding motivations, and condoning criminal actions. Crime is not a necessity, it's a choice.

    I would say that there is no justification, the perceived injustices / moral position being legitimate or not, are no justification in any way for Criminal activities.

    1. tiggity Silver badge

      crime means crime (or not)

      The crime means crime concept is rather simplistic.

      In the UK some recreational drugs are legal (some for adults, some for anyone) e.g. alcohol, caffeine, nicotine

      Others are not e.g. THC (a cannabis component)

      Arbitrary historical events have led to good & bad recreational drugs dichotomy, but you could get lots of cogent argument on why cannabis should be legal or alternatively why alcohol or cigarettes should be banned.

      There are some crimes on the books where the overwhelming majority of people will agree it's a crime.

      Plenty of others where people will disagree, especially depending on arguably excessive consequences - e.g. I doubt a huge number of people applaud prison sentences for low / no income women just because they failed to pay UK TV licence.

      Anyone who has had a few too many beers and found the city centre no longer has any public toilets open & its ages to wait for next bus may not regard public urination as a crime (or indeed a sex crime as it is sometimes made out to be)

    2. Michael Thibault
      Facepalm

      >no justification in any way for Criminal activities.

      I don't disagree. However, that this new institution (*) has arisen at all could be taken either: as a sign that the milking of the largest number of humanity for profit to the benefit of an ever-shrinking number of the club has gone too far, and wants remediation; or, an opportunity for capitalists to innovate around a little *market excess.

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