Russian authorities have detained a suspected administrator of LeakBase, a major online marketplace for stolen data, weeks after U.S. and European law enforcement agencies carried out a global crackdown on the platform.
Russia’s Interior Ministry said Wednesday that police had arrested a resident of the southern city of Taganrog suspected of running an online platform that traded databases containing stolen personal information.
The ministry’s spokeswoman, Irina Volk, did not name the platform, but the Russian state news agency TASS, citing law enforcement sources, identified it as LeakBase.
According to the ministry, the forum hosted hundreds of millions of compromised user records, including banking information, login credentials, and corporate documents obtained through hacking operations. More than 147,000 users were registered on the platform, where cybercriminals could buy and sell stolen databases or use them to carry out fraud.
During a search of the suspect’s residence, police seized computer equipment and other evidence. Footage released by the ministry showed Russian law enforcement detaining the suspect near his car and questioning him in a garage containing computer hardware allegedly linked to the operation.
The arrest follows a coordinated international operation earlier this month targeting LeakBase’s infrastructure. The FBI, working with European partners, conducted more than 100 law enforcement actions against 45 individuals across more than a dozen countries, according to U.S. authorities.
The operation resulted in the seizure of several domains used by the forum and the shutdown of hosting infrastructure in countries including the Netherlands and Malaysia. Authorities redirected the site’s domains to FBI-controlled servers as part of the takedown.
Launched in 2021, LeakBase operated as a subscription-based cybercrime marketplace where users could purchase access to databases containing compromised credentials, personal information, and other sensitive records. Some members paid hundreds of dollars for premium access to the platform.
Much of the data advertised on the forum was obtained through unauthorized access to government systems and U.S. companies. According to Europol, one of the forum’s internal rules prohibited the sale or publication of data related to Russia.
It was not immediately clear whether Russian authorities coordinated the arrest with Western law enforcement. Europol suspended cooperation with Russia after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
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