Cyber correspondent, BBC World Service
Bloomberg through Getty PhotosAn abusive electronic mail despatched by the Marks & Spencer hackers to the retailer’s boss gloating concerning the hack and demanding cost has been seen by the BBC.
The message to M&S CEO Stuart Machin – which was in damaged English – was despatched on the 23 April from the hacker group referred to as DragonForce utilizing the e-mail account of an worker.
The e-mail confirms for the primary time that M&S has been hacked by the ransomware group – one thing that M&S has to date refused to acknowledge.
“We’ve marched the methods from China all the way in which to the UK and have mercilessly raped your organization and encrypted all of the servers,” the hackers wrote.
“The dragon desires to talk to you so please head over to [our darknet website].”
The extortion electronic mail was proven to the BBC by a cyber-security knowledgeable.
The blackmail message, which incorporates the n-word, was despatched to the M&S CEO and 7 different executives.
In addition to bragging about putting in ransomware throughout the M&S IT system to render it ineffective, the hackers say they’ve stolen the non-public information of tens of millions of shoppers.
Practically three weeks later customers were informed by the corporate that their information might have been stolen.
The e-mail was despatched apparently utilizing the account of an worker from the Indian IT big Tata Consultancy Companies (TCS) – which has offered IT providers to M&S for over a decade.
The Indian IT employee based mostly in London has an M&S electronic mail tackle however is a paid TCS worker.
It seems as if he himself was hacked within the assault.
TCS has beforehand mentioned it is investigating whether or not it was the gateway for the cyber-attack.
The corporate has informed the BBC that the e-mail was not despatched from its system and that it has nothing to do with the breach at M&S.
M&S has declined to remark totally.
‘We will each assist one another’
A darknet hyperlink shared within the extortion electronic mail connects to a portal for DragonForce victims to start negotiating the ransom price. That is additional indication that the e-mail is genuine.
Sharing the hyperlink – the hackers wrote: “let’s get the social gathering began. Message us, we’ll make this quick and straightforward for us.”
The criminals additionally seem to have particulars concerning the firm’s cyber-insurance coverage too saying “we all know we are able to each assist one another handsomely : ))”.
The M&S CEO has refused to say if the corporate has paid a ransom to the hackers.
DragonForce ended the e-mail with a picture of a dragon respiratory fireplace.
The e-mail confirms for the primary time the hyperlink between M&S’s hack and the ongoing Co-op cyber-attack, which DragonForce have additionally claimed accountability for.
The 2 hacks – which started in late April – have wrought havoc on the 2 retailers. Some Co-op cabinets had been left naked for weeks, whereas M&S expects its operations to be disrupted till July.
Though we now know that DragonForce is behind each, it’s nonetheless not clear who the precise hackers are.
DragonForce provides cyber-criminal associates numerous providers on their darknet website in trade for a 20% lower of any ransoms collected.
Anybody can enroll and use their malicious software program to scramble a sufferer’s information or use their darknet web site for his or her public extortion.
Nothing has appeared on the prison’s darknet leak website about both Co-op or M&S however the hackers informed the BBC final week that they had been having IT issued of their very own and could be posting data “very quickly.”
Some researchers say DragonForce are based mostly in Malaysia, whereas others say Russia. Their electronic mail to M&S implies that they’re from China.
Hypothesis has been mounting {that a} unfastened collective of younger western hackers generally known as Scattered Spider may be the associates behind the hacks and in addition one on Harrods.
Scattered Spider will not be actually a gaggle within the regular sense of the phrase. It is extra of a group which organises throughout websites like Discord, Telegram and boards – therefore the outline “scattered” which was given to them by cyber-security researchers at CrowdStrike.
Some Scattered Spider hackers are recognized to be youngsters within the US and UK.
The UK’s Nationwide Crime Company mentioned in a BBC documentary concerning the retail hacks, that they’re focusing investigations on the group.
The BBC spoke to the Co-op hackers who declined to reply whether or not or not they had been Scattered Spider. “We cannot reply that query” is all they mentioned.
Two of them mentioned they wished to be generally known as “Raymond Reddington” and “Dembe Zuma” after characters from US crime thriller The Blacklist which includes a wished prison serving to police take down different criminals on a blacklist.
In a message to me, they boasted: “We’re placing UK retailers on the Blacklist.”
There have been a sequence of smaller cyber-attacks on UK retailers since however none as impactful of disruptive as these on Co-op, M&S and Harrods.
Within the early levels of the M&S hack, unknown sources informed cyber information website Bleeping Laptop that proof is pointing to Scattered Spider.
The UK’s national cyber-crime unit has confirmed to the BBC that the group is one in every of their key suspects.
As for the hackers I spoke to on Telegram, they declined to reply whether or not or not they had been Scattered Spider. “We cannot reply that query” is all they mentioned.
