Panda Security Insight

We have often described how online mafias are highly organized regarding strategic and operational vision, logistics and deployment. Not only do they seem like real companies, they are also international organizations operating across the globe.

The FBI has recently classified the different ‘professional positions’ they have encountered in the cyber-crime business, in an attempt to describe the most common figures that profit through online theft, extortion and fraud.

According to the FBI, cyber-crime organizations operate like companies, with experts specialized in each area and position. Yet unlike most companies, they don’t have timetables, holidays or weekends.

The most common ‘positions’ or specializations according to the FBI are:

1. Coders/programmers, who develop the exploits and malware used to commit cyber-crime
2. Distributors,  who collect and sell stolen data, acting as intermediaries
3. Experts technicians, who maintain the criminal “company’s” infrastructure (servers, encryption technologies, databases, etc.)
4. Hackers, who search for exploit applications, and system and network vulnerabilities
5. Fraudsters, who create social engineering techniques and launch different attacks (phishing, spam, etc.)
6. Hosted system providers, who provide a safe environment to host illicit content on servers and pages
7. Cashiers, who control and provide victims’ names and accounts to other criminals for a fee
8. Money mules, who carry out bank transfers between bank accounts
9. Tellers, who launder the money
10. Organization Leaders, who are usually normal people without technical knowledge who create a team and define the objectives

Cyber-crime organizations have a hierarchical structure whereby every action is performed by specialists. If you think about the different countries they are present in, you will get a clear idea of the number of people involved in these criminal activities, and who benefit from the anonymity provided by the Internet.

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