Europol shuts down one of the world's largest hacker forums

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Notice from the authorities on the former hacker website

Photo: Europol

According to Europol, international investigators have dug up one of the largest hacker forums in the world.

The illegal marketplace "RaidForums" has been closed and its infrastructure confiscated, Europol announced on Tuesday in The Hague.

The administrator of the forum and two accomplices were arrested.

In the United States, immediate charges were brought against the site's alleged founder and main administrator.

The 21-year-old Portuguese was arrested in Britain on January 31 and is said to remain in custody while the United States requests his extradition.

The case should be heard before a district court in the US state of Virginia, said the US Department of Justice.

Three domains related to the forum were confiscated by court order.

Different levels of membership

According to Europol, investigators from the USA, Great Britain, Sweden, Portugal, Romania and the German Federal Criminal Police Office were involved in the "tourniquet" operation.

According to Europol, RaidForums was set up in 2015 and had more than half a million users.

Access to stolen credit card data, bank accounts and access data for online accounts were traded on a large scale on the online platform.

According to Europol, this information has been compiled over the years from data leaks and other illegal sources in databases.

In order to benefit from the activities on the platform, the operators have therefore demanded increasing fees for different levels of membership.

Depending on the price, these would have offered better access to the system's databases and more functions, the US Department of Justice said in a statement.

The highest membership status therefore had the designation »God«.

The investigators had been preparing the action for a year.

It was coordinated by Europol's cybercrime specialists.

mak/dpa/Reuters