British hacker IntelBroker faces years in a US jail cell
A 25-year-old British nationwide named as Kai West faces a prolonged jail time period within the US after a sequence of costs in opposition to him have been unsealed by the US authorities, alleging his involvement in a number of cyber assaults.
West is alleged to have been behind the IntelBroker identification. Working with a gaggle of hackers, he’s accused of conducting roughly 40 hacks in opposition to US targets over a two-year interval, and doubtless many extra, from which he stole after which tried to promote information on an underground hacking discussion board. The Individuals didn’t title the discussion board of their indictment, however it’s an open secret that it was BreachForums.
The Division of Justice stated West and his cohorts precipitated in extra of $25m of damages to their varied victims.
A few of the larger profile assaults to which he was linked embrace a March 2023 incident at American medical insurance market DC Well being Hyperlink which uncovered the info of members of the US Congress; an October 2024 incident at Cisco wherein information was stolen from a public-facing DevHub surroundings; and a January 2025 assault on Hewlett-Packard Enterprise (HPE) wherein information was supposedly stolen kind its networks.
Jay Clauton, US lawyer for the Southern District of New York, stated: “The IntelBroker alias has precipitated tens of millions in damages to victims world wide. This motion displays the FBI’s dedication to pursuing cyber criminals world wide. New Yorkers are all too usually the victims of intentional cyber schemes and our workplace is dedicated to bringing these distant actors to justice.”
FBI assistant director in cost Christopher Raia added: “Kai West, an alleged serial hacker, is charged for a nefarious, years-long scheme to steal sufferer’s information and promote it for tens of millions in illicit funds, inflicting greater than $25m in damages worldwide.
“As we speak’s announcement ought to function a warning to anybody pondering they’ll cover behind a keyboard and commit cyber crime with impunity – the FBI will discover and maintain you accountable irrespective of the place you might be.”
Notoriety
The US’ indictment alleges that West and his co-conspirators sought to gather roughly $2m from the sale of the stolen information by way of BreachForums. Based mostly on a overview of his posts on the darkish market, West opened as many as 158 threads providing information on the market, discussion board credit score, or at one time seven at no cost.
West’s postings and gross sales gained him a sure notoriety among the many discussion board’s different denizens and round August – based on information shared with Laptop Weekly by Sophos Counter Risk Unit (CTU) information supervisor Rebecca Taylor – he inherited full management of BreachForums, a place he retained till stepping down in January 2025.
West was arrested in France in February, shortly after stepping down, and stays in custody there pending extradition to the US, the place he’ll face costs of conspiracy to commit pc intrusions, accessing a defending pc, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and wire fraud.
“We’ve been monitoring IntelBroker and the positioning BreachForums, the place a lot of the info was bought over its many iterations, for a number of years,” stated Taylor. “That is one other vital step ahead within the continued struggle in opposition to cyber crime [and] demonstrates that the place cyber crime perpetrators are inside the jurisdiction of Western regulation enforcement, they are going to be delivered to justice.”
The destiny of BreachForums
The broader historical past of BreachForums might be dated again a decade when a predecessor underground discussion board known as RaidForums was arrange by a hacker going by the deal with All-powerful.
At its peak, RaidForums boasted greater than half 1,000,000 lively customers, earlier than being disrupted in 2022 by British regulation enforcement in an motion that noticed All-powerful – named as Diego Santos Coelho – arrested.
RaidForums subsequently went darkish, however barely a month later, a consumer often known as Pompmpurin, aka Conor Fitzpatrick, arrange BreachForums as a direct successor. Fitzpatrick ran the service for a few yr earlier than being seized in New York throughout an FBI investigation into the DC Well being Hyperlink leak.
Its homeowners worrying for their very own safety, BreachForums then shut down for about two months till June 2023, at which level two distinct risk actors – one the ShinyHunters collective, the opposite often known as Baphomet – relaunched it but once more.
The revived BreachForums once more lasted a bit of below a yr till it was taken down in a joint motion by the FBI and the UK’s Nationwide Crime Company (NCA) in Might 2024.
Not ones to be deterred simply, the hackers resurfaced BreachForums on a brand new area barely a fortnight later, however behind the scenes management modifications have been already afoot. Based on the timeline shared by Sophos, ShinyHunters stepped apart in June 2024, and one other particular person utilizing the deal with Anastasia took management and ran BreachForums for about two months, till being supplanted by IntelBroker.
Following IntelBroker’s arrest and elimination as discussion board chief in favour of Anastasia, BreachForums subsequently went darkish on the finish of April 2025. Based on Sophos, there might have been some inner suspicions among the many hackers that regulation enforcement was making the most of vulnerabilities within the discussion board’s software program. However, they have been capable of relaunch it once more on 4 June 2025, with the discussion board as soon as extra below the management of ShinyHunters,
This comeback was shortlived, because the discussion board went up on the market on 9 June for the sum of $2,500. Then, on 22 June, the French authorities arrested one other ShinyHunters member and different BreachForums-linked hackers.
Whether or not or not this motion will mark the top of the darkish internet discussion board stays to be seen.
