The U.S. State Department will pay $10 million for information leading to the identification or location of hackers who work for foreign governments and are planning attacks on the countrys critical infrastructure. According to the departments site, the reward may be paid in cryptocurrency.
The initiative is part of the State Departments Rewards for Justice program. In the statement, it says that to protect the safety of potential sources the department has set up a data-transfer channel on the Tor network. For the same purpose, informants could be paid in digital assets.
Rewards for Justice was launched in 1984 to combat international terrorism. The program is administered by the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, a part of the State Department. Over the life of the initiative, rewards have been paid to more than 100 people — the government has paid about $200 million.
On July 15, Bloomberg reported that The White House has formed a ransomware working group. The Biden administration is allegedly aiming to combat criminals use of cryptocurrency by tracking ransoms paid by victims.
Earlier, Biden urged Vladimir Putin to curb ransomware attacks on American companies carried out from Russian territory. Later, the American president answered affirmatively to the question about the possibility of disabling hacker servers by the United States.
In May, the largest pipeline company in the United States, Colonial Pipeline, paid the hackers a ransom of $5 million in cryptocurrency to regain control over its infrastructure. The attack was carried out by the DarkSide group, whose activity is linked to Russia.
In the same month, CNA Financial paid $40 million to restore control over its computer networks after the Phoenix Locker ransomware attack.
Recall that in early July, the Cozy Bear hacker group, which is linked to Russian intelligence services, hacked the computer systems of the Republican National Committee.
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