This Person Earns Crypto Worth IDR 31.17 Billion Cryptojacking Results

Police arrested cryptojacking cybercriminals. (Photo; Doc. Justgeek)

JAKARTA Cybercrime is getting more sophisticated over time including cryptojacking. Recently this Ukrainian police managed to arrest a 29-year-old man in Mykolaiv. This man is suspected of being the mastermind behind the cryptojacking scheme. He managed to mine crypto worth more than $2 million (around Rp31.17 billion) using illegally accessed cloud resources.

For additional information, cryptojacking is a form of cybercrime involving illegal cryptocurrency mining using other people's computing resources without their permission. Perpetrators, known as cryptojackers, usually insert malicious scripts into websites or emails, which then run mining codes on victims' devices when they visit websites or open the email.

The arrest of the main actor in cryptojacking is the result of a joint effort between the Ukrainian Police, the European Police (Europol), and a cloud computing service provider. According to Europol, this arrest shows the importance of inter-sectoral synergy in dealing with cyber threats.

In January 2023, cloud service providers reported to Europol about the user accounts they had found. This information was then shared with Ukrainian authorities, which immediately opened an investigation. The investigation involved searches on three properties related to cryptojackers.

Europol's European Cybercrime Center (EC3) established a command post to support arrest operations carried out by the Ukrainian National Police. In its official statement, Europol also shared some anti-cryptojacking tips for cloud service providers.

One of the suggestions provided is the application of strong access control and routine monitoring of the cloud environment for suspicious activity, as well as periodic updating of cloud resources.

Warning to Indonesia

This case is a warning to cloud service providers in Indonesia, who also face similar threats. According to a report from Kaspersky, Indonesia experienced an increase in cryptojacking cases by 12% in the first quarter of 2020, with more than one million cases of illegal mining detected among small and medium enterprises.

The crime of money laundering in cryptocurrencies has also increased, reaching US$8.6 billion (around Rp123.6 trillion) in 2021. This situation implies the importance of cloud service providers in Indonesia to improve security and implement effective preventive measures to protect their infrastructure from cyber crime.