Hacker groups have intensified their Bitcoin extortion activities in recent days

     Since September last year, a hacker group called DD4BC has been exposed for its extortion activities, launching a series of DDoS attacks against its targets and demanding that they pay a ransom in Bitcoin in exchange for stopping the attacks.

There are signs that the organization or extortion group's attack activities have intensified recently. Last year, DD4BC launched a total of 141 DDoS attacks.

Akamai recently tracked and analyzed the activities of DD4BC in recent months through its Prolexic Engineering Security and Response Team. Its attack behavior has greatly increased in recent months, including many Akamai customers who have suffered from its extortion. These customers are mostly concentrated in financial institutions, which have more opportunities to access Bitcoin transactions than other industries. Although each attack is mostly small-scale, large-scale DDoS attacks also exist. The largest attack data traffic reaches 56Gbps, and the average traffic is around 13.34Gbps. The general mode of attack is to send an anonymous extortion email and ask for Bitcoin. The number of Bitcoins required is around 25-100, with a value of $6000-$24000. If the payment requirement is not met, the organization will launch a series of DDoS attacks, causing its website network to be paralyzed, and publicize it through social media, affecting its company image or reputation.