First VPN Dismantled in Global Takedown Over Use by 25 Ransomware Groups

An international law enforcement operation has successfully dismantled First VPN, a criminal VPN service actively used by at least 25 ransomware groups since 2014.

• •Led by France and Netherlands with support from 15 other nations including the U.S., UK, Canada, and others, the May 19-20 operation seized 33 servers globally
• •First VPN operated 32 exit node servers across 27 countries and was promoted on Russian cybercrime forums like Exploit.in as a tool to evade law enforcement
• •The service offered multiple VPN protocols including OpenVPN, WireGuard, Outline, and VLESS/Reality, the latter capable of disguising VPN traffic as HTTPS
• •Subscription pricing ranged from $2 per day to $483 per year, accepting payments via Bitcoin, Perfect Money, Webmoney, EgoPay, and InterKass

This summary was automatically generated by AI based on the original article and may not be fully accurate.