In recent years, the dark web has become notorious for being a hub of illegal activities, including the buying and selling of stolen credit card information. This underground network allows cybercriminals to operate anonymously, making it difficult for law enforcement to track them down.
What is the Dark Web?
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The dark web is a part of the internet that is not indexed by traditional search engines. It requires special software, such as Tor, to access. While the dark web is used for legitimate purposes, it has also become a breeding ground for criminal activity.
Is The Dark Web Illegal?
- Credit monitoring services claim to protect you from identity theft, but they mostly alert you after it happens.
- Carders tend to target specific sites that don’t have VBV or other protections against fraud.
- This will encrypt your connection, hiding your IP address and geo-location tags from view while passing through several exit nodes so your end destination cannot be tracked back to you.
- As a result, in order for word to get out in regard to fresh URLs for the service, the hackers are distributing the data free of charge.
At the time of this publication, the marketplace holds an inventory of over 2,749,336 credit cards, with an average price per card of $US 6. Since late May 2021, the threat actor has been actively advertising and promoting the new platform on different Dark Web hacking-related platforms. The current leak of one million credit cards by the threat actor appears to be another marketing move to attract potential clients from hacking and cybercrime forums and increase the platform’s popularity. However, a dump of 1.2 million stolen credit card numbers for free is an unusually large amount. At the time of the dump, BidenCash had just a little over two million numbers for sale.
The Dangers of Dark Web Credit Card Theft
One of the most common illicit activities on the dark web is the sale of stolen credit card information. Cybercriminals use various methods to obtain this information, including phishing scams, data breaches, and malware attacks. Once they have the credit card details, they sell them on the dark web to the highest bidder.
How Do The Fraudsters Obtain Credit Cards?
Chillingly, this sample represents only a small fraction of all stolen payment information available on the dark web — it is but the tip of the iceberg of credit card theft worldwide. According to Cyble, the exposed information included the name of the cardholder, CVV code, billing details, and expiration date, which were selling at $5 per card, and the money was paid in cryptocurrency. While the source of this massive stolen credit card database was unknown, the researchers stated that hackers might have stolen these details via a phishing website or by compromising an online store. You may have recently read headlines about an online shop that was selling millions of stolen credit cards. Questions were even raised by a British politician in the UK Parliament about why this site was allowed to operate and outrage was voiced that tens of thousands of UK cardholders’ data was up for sale on the site.
Why is Dark Web Credit Card Theft Dangerous?
Dark web credit card theft can have devastating consequences for victims. Not only can it result in financial losses, but it can also lead to identity theft and fraud. Victims may find themselves facing unauthorized charges, ruined credit scores, and difficulty obtaining loans or credit in the future.
Remember that even if you are a victim of fraud, federal law limits your liability to no more than $50 of unauthorized charges. Most credit card issuers take it a step further and have zero-liability policies. If your credit card has a zero-liability policy, and the vast majority do, you won’t need to pay anything for fraudulent charges.
It is crucial for individuals to take steps to protect their credit card information from falling into the hands of cybercriminals.
Protecting Yourself from Dark Web Credit Card Theft
There are several measures you can take to safeguard your credit card information:
- Avoid clicking on suspicious links or downloading attachments from unknown sources.
- Regularly monitor your credit card statements for any unauthorized charges.
- Use strong, unique passwords for your online accounts and enable two-factor authentication whenever possible.
- Consider using a credit monitoring service to alert you to any unusual activity on your credit report.
Very soon after that meeting, nCux announced one last dump for sale and that they’re quitting the carding world. UniCC – the leading dark web marketplace of stolen credit cards – has announced its retirement. Elliptic analysis shows that $358 million in purchases were made through the market since 2013 using cryptocurrencies. An Illinois man accused of operating a darknet carding site and selling information from tens of thousands of stolen credit cards pleaded guilty Tuesday in a Missouri courtroom. Research by NordVPN found that there were nearly 1.6 million sets of payment card details available from the United States alone on the dark web. NordVPN reported that a hacked payment’s card data costs less than $10 on average.
By staying vigilant and taking proactive steps to protect your personal information, you can reduce the risk of falling victim to dark web credit card theft.
