Authorities in ten countries, including those in the Netherlands and France, coordinated operations against VPNLab on Monday.

Led by the police department in Hannover, Germany, authorities seized 15 servers.

This coordination helped bring VPNLab, a well-known VPN service to cybercriminals, offline.

Based on OpenVPN technology and 2048-bit encryption, it guaranteed online anonymity for just $60 per year.

At least 100 companies are said to be at risk of imminent cyberattacks.

Europol did not disclose the names of these potential victims but notified them.

VPNLab, the choice of cybercriminals

A VPN allows you to browse the web while concealing your identity and location. For example, companies use this technology to set up secure home office networks. VPNs can also be used to protect a search history, block online advertising, prevent location tracking by government surveillance, or bypass streaming service geoblocking restrictions.

The only problem for this case, VPNLab was "a popular choice for cybercriminals, who could use its services to continue committing their crimes without fear of detection by the authorities", explains Europol. The agency adds, "Multiple investigations have found that criminals were using the VPNLab.net service to facilitate illicit activities such as malware distribution." According to the same statements, the VPN also advertised its services on dark web forums. The investigators also discovered the illegal services of VPNLab thanks to these classified ads.

In a separate statement, Ukrainian cyberpolice said the VPN service was used in more than 150 ransomware infections.

His victims would have paid a total of 60 million euros in ransoms.

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  • Cybersecurity

  • high tech

  • Cybercriminality

  • Phishing

  • cyberattack

  • Police

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