The Netherlands Just Confiscated 800 Servers From a Russian Proxy Hosting Firm
FIOD, the Dutch financial crime investigators, arrested two men and seized 800 servers from a web hosting operation that turned out to be a Dutch front company for Stark Industries — the bulletproof hosting provider that the EU sanctioned last May for enabling Russian cyberattacks, DDoS operations, and information manipulation. The host, branded as THE.Hosting and operated by a company called WorkTitans B.V., was set up right after the EU sanctions froze Stark's original infrastructure, as if someone in the Neculiti brothers' orbit decided that a fresh Dutch BV with a different logo would be enough to slip past Brussels. What makes this story worth paying attention to goes beyond the theatrical "800 servers in a heap" headline. It's the business model on display. Stark Industries built its reputation accepting Monero and Dash, hosting FIN7 infrastructure, and turning a blind eye to anything with enough rubles to pay the invoice. When the EU slapped sanctions, the...