Updated on 2022-11-18: Popopret pleads guilty
Daniel Kaye, known for his hacker monikers of BestBuy and PopoPret, has pleaded guilty to running The Real Deal dark web marketplace after being arraigned in a US court earlier this month. Not only that, but Kaye was also already sentenced to time served and one year of supervised release. As DataBreaches.net suggests, Kaye appears to have reached some sort of deal with US investigators. The deal might be related to a US investigation into a notorious hacking group known as TheDarkOverlord, which used to sell the data of hacked companies on Kaye’s marketplace. Read more: Surprise: Daniel Kaye, operator of The Real Deal, pleads guilty to one count, is sentenced to time served, and is released.
Updated on 2022-10-30: Liberia DDoS’er charged with running dark web marketplace
Daniel Kaye will ring bells for some. Kaye was arraigned on federal charges this week for alleged device fraud and money laundering as part of his role in running The Real Deal, a dark web marketplace that sold hacking tools and stolen credentials, including for NASA, the U.S. Navy — oh, and Twitter and LinkedIn. But Kaye is also known for knocking Liberia’s internet offline during a 2016 DDoS attack, for which he was arrested and detained by U.K. police. I remember reporting on the DDoS at the time (despite some skepticism from others!). If you didn’t read Bloomberg’s story about Liberia’s internet, you should. @MalwareTechBlog reminisces in a tweet thread. Read more:
Didn't think I'd hear this name again. Was tracking him back in 2016 when he took offline the UK's largest bank, Crashed nearly 1 million Germans' internet routers, and tried to take out Liberia's largest ISP. Dude was a straight menace. https://t.co/aLcjO5WEH0
— Marcus Hutchins (@MalwareTechBlog) October 26, 2022
Overview: Popopret/BestBuy arraigned in US court
The US Department of Justice arraigned in court Daniel Kaye, a British national, for his role in operating The Real Deal, a former dark web marketplace where criminals traded stolen data and credentials. Kaye, who went online under names like Popopret and Bestbuy, was extradited from Cyprus to face charges. In 2017, Kaye also received a suspended prison sentence of one year and eight months in Germany after he hijacked and crashed more than 900,000 Deutsche Telekom routers. In 2019, Kaye was also sentenced to two years and eight months in the UK for using a copy of the Mirai malware to build a DDoS botnet to attack UK ISPs. He also used the same botnet as part of a DDoS-for-hire service to take down the connectivity of a major Liberian ISP at the request of one of their competitors. Read more:
- Hacker and Dark Market operator arraigned on federal charges
- After Dodging Prison in Germany, Mirai Hacker “BestBuy” Charged in the UK
- Hacker ‘BestBuy’ sentenced to prison for operating Mirai DDoS botnet
Didn't think I'd hear this name again. Was tracking him back in 2016 when he took offline the UK's largest bank, Crashed nearly 1 million Germans' internet routers, and tried to take out Liberia's largest ISP. Dude was a straight menace. https://t.co/aLcjO5WEH0
— Marcus Hutchins (@MalwareTechBlog) October 26, 2022
