As part of Team Cymru's mission to Save and Improve Human Lives, we were honored to be invited again to support INTERPOL with Operation Synergia II. This partnership successfully led to 41 Arrests Across 95 Countries after coordinated efforts that disrupted over 22,000 malicious IP addresses and servers between April 1 and August 31, 2024. This massive takedown operation, involving law enforcement agencies from 95 INTERPOL member countries, specifically targeted phishing operations, information stealers, and ransomware infrastructure that directly threaten communities worldwide.
This mission aligns with INTERPOL's own commitment to protecting global communities. As Craig Jones, Former Director of Cybercrime at INTERPOL recently explained on the Future of Threat Intelligence podcast: "The purpose of our program is to reduce the global impact of cybercrime and protect communities for a safer world. It's simple. That's what we're trying to do. We're trying to make the world safer, and we're trying to stop the harm from the cybercriminals impacting our communities."
Our Role in the Operation
Working alongside other partners, Team Cymru contributed to Operation Synergia II by identifying and categorizing malicious infrastructure using our own Internet telemetry data platform: Pure Signal. Our specialized Internet tagging team collaborated with our S2 Threat Research Team to research, assess, then validate their findings at the scale of the Internet that the operation needed for success. These efforts provided INTERPOL with high-confidence attributions of malicious servers and infrastructure.
Our methodology included:
Implementing comprehensive analysis of banking malware and phishing infrastructure
Categorizing Internet-facing nodes through our extensive tagging system
Investigations into specific malware families
Providing validated data to assist in the creation of threat intelligence reports
Operation Synergia II Impact and Results
Team Cymru is proud of the contributions to this mission, providing the scale and visibility needed to map malicious infrastructures in real-time as it dynamically evolves. The operation demonstrated the effectiveness of public-private partnerships in combating cybercrime. According to INTERPOL, key outcomes included:
Identification of approximately 30,000 suspicious IP addresses
Successful takedown of 76% of identified malicious infrastructure
Seizure of 59 servers and 43 electronic devices
41 arrests, with 65 additional individuals under investigation
INTERPOL Targeting Critical Cyber Threats
Operation Synergia II specifically addressed three critical areas of cybercrime that continue to pose significant threats to organizations and individuals worldwide:
Phishing Infrastructure: As the most commonly reported initial access technique, phishing remains a primary concern, especially with cybercriminals now leveraging Generative AI to create convincing, more sophisticated, multilingual attacks.
Information Stealers: With a 40% increase in the sale of stolen data logs on the dark web in 2023, information stealers represent a growing threat to sensitive data and system security.
Ransomware Operations: The past year saw a 70% increase in ransomware attacks across all industries, with threat actors expanding both their targeted sectors and geographical reach.
Looking Forward
Operation Synergia II represents just how important collaborative efforts are in the fight against cybercrime. Team Cymru's 25-year experience of providing infrastructure analysis capabilities contributed to the operation's success, supporting INTERPOL and its member countries in taking action against cybercriminal infrastructure.
As cyber threats continue to evolve, Team Cymru remains committed to working alongside law enforcement and industry partners to detect, analyze, and disrupt malicious cyber infrastructure worldwide. Through operations like Synergia II, we proudly continue to fulfill our mission to Save and Improve Human Lives by making the digital world safer for everyone. This operation stands as a testament to how public-private partnerships can effectively combat global cybercrime and protect communities everywhere.
For more information about Operation Synergia II and its global impact, read INTERPOL's official press release.