Uk Authorities Arrest Four Suspected Members Of Hacker Group Scattered Spider

The National Crime Agency (NCA) successful London has arrested 2 19-year-old men, a 17-year-old boy and a 20-year-old female connected suspicion of blackmail, money laundering, organized crime and contravening nan Computer Misuse Act. These arrests are portion of an investigation into a bid of cyberattacks connected 3 ample UK retailers — Marks & Spencer, Harrods and Co-op — earlier this year.

UK investigators judge nan suspects are connected pinch a loose-knit English-speaking hacker group called Scattered Spider, which has been blamed for a bid of high-profile incidents. For Co-op, this was nan second specified incident this year, aft a hacking group called DragonForce gained entree to nan retailer's rank data. Scattered Spider was implicated successful 2023 erstwhile US-based casino concatenation Caesars Entertainment reportedly paid tens of millions of dollars to nan group successful bid to support its customers’ information from being exposed.

Marks & Spencer was attacked successful April and was forced to unopen down its online shop for complete a month. Co-op fell unfortunate nan aforesaid period successful an onslaught that led to a partial shutdown of its IT system. Harrods disclosed connected May 1 that it had staved disconnected an attempted onslaught by restricting net entree crossed its websites.

"Since these attacks took place, master NCA cybercrime investigators person been moving astatine gait and nan investigation remains 1 of nan agency’s highest priorities," said Paul Foster, caput of nan NCA's nationalist cybercrime unit.

The 4 suspects stay successful custody for questioning.