A black market website that let customers buy access to thousands of hacked servers across the world has been shut down.
On Monday, US federal investigators announced they had pulled the plug on xDedic, a marketplace that was promoting itself on the open internet. The website's domain has now been seized and replaced with a takeover notice from the FBI.
Law enforcement in Europe also seized xDedic's servers and detained four Ukrainians who helped run the website. The marketplace was so prolific it had sold the login credentials to over 70,000 remote servers from 170 countries, according to Ukraine's cyber authority.
"Based on evidence obtained during the investigation, authorities believe the website facilitated more than $68 million in fraud," the US Department of Justice said in a statement.
For years, xDedic functioned as a platform for hackers to sell access to servers they had breached. These servers included those owned by business, governments, universities, and hospitals. With such access, buyers could pilfer all the valuable information inside, such as credit card numbers or other personal data. They could also use the hardware to propagate new hacking schemes, like sending spam email or spreading ransomware.
In 2016, security firm Kaspersky Lab first reported the existence of xDedic, which at the time was offering server sales for as little as $6. Many of the servers were likely breached after hackers guessed remote login credentials through simple trial-and-error.
"Users of xDedic could search for compromised computer credentials by criteria, such as price, geographic location, and operating system," Europol said. The marketplace also helped protect buyers and sellers identities by facilitating transactions with the virtual currency Bitcoin.
However, the shutdown of xDedic may help authorities unmask who was buying and selling on the website. Ukrainian authorities detained four suspects behind the marketplace and seized 18TB worth of data connected to xDedic, which they plan on examining.