ShinyHunters Claim Hack of Rival Ransomware Gang Clop

Authorities in the Netherlands have arrested a 24-year-old convicted cybercriminal on suspicion of aiding in data thefts and extortions by the prolific hacker group ShinyHunters . In the days immediately following the suspect’s arrest, remaining ShinyHunters members dramatically escalated their attacks, stealing highly sensitive data from the FBI and extorting the Russian ransomware group Cl0p . According to three sources familiar with the matter, the Dutch man arrested by authorities this month is Pepijn van der Stap , a convicted cybercriminal from Almere and Lelystad in the Netherlands. Van der Stap was previously convicted in 2023 in connection with a string of data thefts and extortions that prosecutors said earned between €1.5 million and €2.7 million. At his trial in late 2023, van der Stap admitted that he lived a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde existence, secretly using the hacker handle “ Umbreon ” to extort victims and post their data on English language hacking communities like the now-defunct RaidForums and Breached. By day, however, van der Stap was working as a software engineer at the Amsterdam-based cybersecurity startup Hadrian , while volunteering at the Dutch Institute for Vulnerability Disclosure (DIVD), a nonprofit security research group. Pepijn van der Stap’s alter ego “Umbreon” selling a database on RaidForums, offering information on 2.3 million people from The Netherlands in September 2021. This user’s avatar is a depiction of the Pokemon character Umbreon. Image: KELA. Van der Stap confessed to his data theft and extortion activity, and was sentenced to four years in prison (one of which was suspended). During his trial, van der Stap opted to remain in custody for a time rather than at home, saying he could not find better treatment on the outside for his ongoing psychological issues, which he claimed included PTSD related to childhood trauma. He was released from prison in December 2025. In an interview with KrebsOnSecurity on September 9, 2026, Van der Stap cast himself as a reformed hacker who was trying to turn his life around and make a positive contribution to society. Van der Stap is currently employed as offensive security lead at the Dutch company Neo Security , which did not respond to requests for comment. Van der Stap said he was still dealing with civil lawsuits and restitution related to his previous cybercrime victims, and that he was trying his best to make amends. But not long after that interview, the Dutch hacker abruptly stopped replying to messages. Efforts by others close to him also repeatedly failed to elicit a response for the past two weeks. The LinkedIn profile for Pepijn van der Stap. According to two sources with knowledge of the matter, Van der Stap was arrested by Dutch authorities on or around September 16, and has been held in custody for questioning since. One source said a colleague of theirs personally witnessed Dutch authorities carting items out of Van der Stap’s residence. Authorities in the Netherlands have been asking the public for help in identifying the voice in a recorded telephone call from February 2026 in which a native Dutch-speaking ShinyHunters member social engineered their way into Odido , the nation’s largest mobile telecommunications provider. In that intrusion, ShinyHunters tricked an Odido employee into logging in at a spoofed website, and then used that access to steal data on more than 6.2 million Dutch people. Responding to Dutch news media, ShinyHunters confirmed that the suspect in the audio clip is indeed a member of the hacker collective. “Our team member has our full support – emotionally, mentally, and financially,” the hackers said. “Everything has been arranged, including a criminal defense lawyer. We do not look down on our staff and members; we take excellent care of them,” reads a statement ShinyHunters shared with NL Times . It remains unclear if the Dutch police have matched the Odido caller to a confirmed real-life identity. The Dutch police unit handling the Odido incident did not respond to requests for comment. The group also lashed out at the authorities in the Netherlands. “The Dutch police will need all the luck in the world – and everyone’s prayers – if they want to catch him before we carry out another large-scale data theft in the Netherlands,” the ShinyHunters statement said. “Frankly, the Dutch police are a big joke; they are incapable of doing anything. Incompetent. Irrelevant. Unimportant. Useless.” FBI, CL0P HACKS Just days after sources say Van der Stap was detained by Dutch authorities, ShinyHunters claimed credit for an unusually brazen breach at the FBI’s job application site apply.fbijobs.gov. According to reporting from 404 Media , the data stolen from the FBI site includes Social Security numbers and personal information on more than 5,000 officials. 404 Media and Reuters reported the FBI data included each person’s job title or team, such as special agent, threat intake examiner, major cybercrimes unit, and those investigating cyber threats from foreign state-backed actors. Reuters examined documents shared by ShinyHunters and found they included sensitive psychiatric and medical files of FBI staff. The FBI issued a brief statement confirming the hack. ShinyHunters said it gained access to the FBI site and other victims by exploiting a recently patched vulnerability (CVE-2026-35273) in PeopleSoft , a software-as-a-service platform from the software giant Oracle that is broadly used by companies to manage hiring and human resources, benefits and payroll. Oracle quickly issued a fix for the Peoplesoft vulnerability that ShinyHunters reportedly began exploiting as a zero-day in June, and at the time Mandiant released web application firewall rules intended for organizations who couldn’t apply the security update quickly enough. But on Friday, BleepingComputer reported that ShinyHunters used a URL-encoding trick to bypass Mandiant’s suggested web application firewall rules designed to mitigate the threat from the PeopleSoft flaw. In a report released Sept. 25, security experts at Mandiant and the Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) confirmed that ShinyHunters had mass-exploited the PeopleSoft vulnerability to steal data from dozens of systems across a range of industries, including higher education, technology, healthcare, agriculture, transportation and government. Van der Stap’s former hacker alias Umbreon was hidden in plain sight throughout the imagery ShinyHunters used to spread news about the FBI hack: The defacement image that ShinyHunters left behind on the hacked FBI jobs site included an ASCII art design featuring the Pokemon character Umbreon. The message at the top read, “This site has been seized by ShinyHunters. rooting your systems since ’19 ;)” The image appears identical to a defacement message ShinyHunters used in their 2020 hack of the English-language cybercrime community Hackforums. The defacement message left by ShinyHunters on the FBI jobs site included an ASCII art rendition of the Pokemon character Umbreon. Image: Bleeping Computer. Multiple sources close to the ShinyHunters investigation said the group’s recent risky attacks against the FBI and one of Russia’s most venerated ransomware groups amounted to a major pivot away from the more measured tenor of the hacking gang’s operations. Those sources said the sudden shift came about after ShinyHunters was taken over by a teenage cybercriminal from Amman, Jordan who goes by the nickname Rey and operates as part of a cybercrime group called ScatteredLapsussHunters (SLSH), which experts say is an amalgamation of three hacking groups — Scattered Spider , LAPSUS$ and ShinyHunters . Those sources said Rey had an ongoing beef with the Dutch hacker over control of the ShinyHunters brand and data, and that the inclusion of the oversized Umbreon Pokemon image in the FBI jobs site defacement was likely an attempt by Rey to pin the hack on the Dutchman. Rey was first publicly identified by the cybersecurity firm KELA in March 2025. In advance of our November 2025 profile of Rey , KrebsOnSecurity messaged Rey’s father and asked for permission to interview his teenage son. Rey’s dad merely forwarded the message to his son, who admitted to participating in ransomware attacks and said he was trying to extricate himself from the SLSH hacker group. BLAMING UMBREON Immediately after news of the FBI jobs site hack was picked up in the media, Rey’s main account on Twitter/X (Ryan Moran/@rmoskovy) was taunting the Cl0p ransomware group and the FBI, crudely depicting them as the twin towers in New York being struck by planes labeled “cl0p drama” and “fbi breach claim.” In the foreground of the city is the giant Pokemon figure of Umbreon. A taunting meme uploaded to Twitter/X by Rey’s now-defunct account on Sept. 22. A giant float-sized version of the Pokemon character Umbreon can be seen in the bottom left. On Sept. 24, KrebsOnSecurity again contacted Rey’s dad, asking to interview him and his son for a story on Rey’s apparent ascendency as the head of ShinyHunters. Just hours after that request, Rey deleted his longtime Twitter/X account. Meanwhile, Rey’s dad, who works for the Royal Jordanian Airlines, has failed to respond to a half-dozen emailed requests for comment about his son’s alleged activities. Where does the bad blood between SLSH and ShinyHunters come from? According to a story in Wired this month, ShinyHunters and SLSH members briefly partnered earlier this year to help better monetize important stolen credentials collected by TeamPCP , an upstart group that was having great success compromising global code supply chains with malicious software but hadn’t been able to profit much from their stolen data (two alleged leaders of TeamPCP were arrested last month in Australia , and in an interview the TeamPCP leader claimed they made just $20,000). The Wired story noted how Mandiant had infiltrated TeamPCP and was secretly responsible for having the crime group’s stolen credentials burned so quickly: Mandiant was secretly feeding those credentials to the major cloud providers like Amazon and Microsoft, who quickly invalidated the stolen keys. Meanwhile, the formerly cooperating hacker groups began to blame one another for causing the credentials to become worthless. Wired’s Andy Greenberg reported that a few weeks after partnering with TeamPCP, “ShinyHunters went rogue, carrying out its own extortions with TeamPCP’s credentials but without giving the supply-chain hackers their cut.” Mandiant researcher Austin Larsen told KrebsOnSecurity earlier this month that ShinyHunters has been enjoying a successful extortion spree so far this year, and is on track to pull in nearly $100 million in extortion payments from cybercrime victims in 2026. Van der Stap claims he was never motivated by money and that his earlier hacker activity was driven by a desire to have the world’s most complete collection of stolen databases. Speaking with reporters from Bloomberg in 2024, Van der Stap said that singular focus in turn fueled his desire to carry out cyberattacks. “The hacking was very easy for me, and it wasn’t a compulsion,” he told Bloomberg . “My habit was collecting. Collecting data, organizing data, downloading data, creating folders.” DIVD, the nonprofit security research group where Van der Stap previously served as a volunteer, disclosed on LinkedIn last week that the organization was dealing with an internal cybersecurity incident that appears to have involved the malicious use of artificial intelligence. DIVD has released few details about that incident, but a spokesperson for the nonprofit told KrebsOnSecurity it does not appear related to ShinyHunters, nor are there any signs the matter involves the work of a previous volunteer. Update: 3:44 p.m. ET: Corrected Van der Stap’s age, which is 24 (not 23). Update, 4:54 p.m. ET: The Dutch police have confirmed the arrest of a 24-year-old in connection with the ShinyHunters investigation. In a statement on Twitter/X , the Dutch police said the man will appear on Tuesday, September 29 before the chambers of the Rotterdam District Court, and that will provide more information tomorrow.

The FBI’s online portals for job applicants (at apply.fbijobs.gov) and special agent applicants (at fbijobs.gov/special-agents) are still unavailable, following what appears to be successful compromises by the ShinyHunters cyber extortion group. Last week, the United States’ domestic intelligence and security service confirmed it was investigating ShinyHunters’ claim of having compromised personal information of FBI employees. ShinyHunters told The Register they leveraged a currently unspecified and unconfirmed Oracle PeopleSoft zero-day vulnerability to breach the portals. They … More → The post FBI job portals remain offline after ShinyHunters claims breach via PeopleSoft zero-day appeared first on Help Net Security .

Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed details of a new botnet malware called Carbonato that's targeting exposed Docker daemons to deploy an open-source artificial intelligence (AI) agent framework called Hermes Agent. "The implant installs the framework unchanged, then overwrites its SOUL.md persona file," ThreatDown said. "The 39-line prompt directs it to execute tasks received through

The extortion group has modified its exploit in new attacks targeting the PeopleSoft vulnerability CVE-2026-35273. The post Google Warns of ShinyHunters’ Fresh Oracle PeopleSoft Campaign appeared first on SecurityWeek .

BBC News reports it has seen samples of stolen FBI agents’ medical examinations. The “fitness-for-work” reports identify FBI agents by name and address, and reveal even more personal details. They include blood and urine test results and doctors’ notes mentioning high cholesterol, blood in the urine, and even a shellfish and banana allergy. As we reported last week, extortion group ShinyHunters claims to have breached the FBI. After  reportedly taking over ransomware group Clop’s leak site , ShinyHunters says it attacked the FBI to punish the agency for spreading what it calls false information about the group. The BBC’s findings raise the stakes: The alleged theft includes highly sensitive medical records, not just staff identity and contact data. ShinyHunters shared samples with journalists as proof of its claims. The BBC states: “The samples shared with journalists appear genuine and include names, addresses, phone numbers, badge numbers, job titles and information about spouses.” ShinyHunters claims it accessed several systems, including FBI MedLink, which stores medical records, and FBI BEAST, which handles background checks on employees and applicants, but the FBI has not confirmed these claims. The FBI has acknowledged an incident affecting FBIJobs-related systems and says it is investigating whether its own environment or a third-party provider was compromised. The group’s stated demand remains non-financial: It wants the FBI to retract or remove a May advisory that ShinyHunters calls false and defamatory. It says it will release the data within five days if its demands are not met. The cybercriminals also raised the number of affected people. ShinyHunters nows claims to hold sensitive information on around 60,000 current and former FBI staff. Medical histories could make affected people vulnerable long after the immediate incident: Unlike a stolen password, a medical record cannot be changed. What to do if you’re affected The FBI has not yet confirmed what information was accessed or who was affected. If you are a current or former FBI employee, a relative of one, or have applied for an FBI job: Check the FBI’s advice.  Every breach is different, so check FBI.gov for updates and follow any specific advice it offers. Change your password.  If you have an FBI Jobs account and reuse its password elsewhere, change it on those other accounts. Choose a  strong password  that you don’t use for anything else. Better yet, let a  password manager  choose one for you. Enable  two-factor authentication  ( 2FA ).  If you can, use a FIDO2-compliant hardware key, laptop, or phone as your second factor. Some forms of 2FA can be phished just as easily as a password, but 2FA that relies on a FIDO2 device can’t be phished. Watch out for impersonators.  Cybercriminals may contact you posing as the FBI, another government agency, or someone you know. Verify the identity of anyone who contacts you. Take your time.  Phishing attacks often impersonate people or brands you know and use themes that require urgent attention, such as missed deliveries, account suspensions, and security alerts. Set up  identity monitoring . This can alert you if your  personal information  is found being traded illegally online and help you recover afterward. Let’s face it, an incognito window can only do so much.     Breaches, dark web trading, credit fraud. Malwarebytes Identity Theft Protection  monitors for all of it, alerts you fast, and comes with identity theft insurance. 

The ShinyHunters extortion gang is using a URL-encoding trick to bypass web application firewall rules that mitigate the Oracle PeopleSoft CVE-2026-35273 flaw, allowing the threat actors to resume widespread exploitation of a flaw on vulnerable servers. [...]

Google is warning of renewed mass exploitation of a known security vulnerability in Oracle PeopleSoft as part of a campaign targeting multiple sectors globally. The ShinyHunters-linked activity involves the weaponization of CVE-2026-35273 (CVSS score: 9.8), a critical security flaw that could result in unauthenticated remote code execution. The vulnerability was first exploited as a zero-day

The Clop ransomware gang has moved its data leak site to a new Tor address after confirming its previous server was compromised and defaced through an unpatched Grav CMS flaw that BleepingComputer has learned is an unauthenticated path traversal vulnerability. [...]

ShinyHunters, the data theft and extortion crew that has stolen sensitive information belonging to millions of cancer patients, university and K-12 students, and Carnival cruisers, wanted to preserve their reputation and keep their “business” afloat. So it hacked the FBI to make a statement, the group told The Register. “It’s a game and it’s the world we live in,” a ShinyHunters spokesperson told us. “We are just protecting our business as any other business would do. It’s about who does their job better.” On Friday, the FBI confirmed the breach to The Register, after earlier in the week saying the bureau was investigating ShinyHunters’ claims. "The FBI is aware of a cyber-criminal enterprise group claiming a compromise of the FBIJobs.gov portal and alleged impact to FBI employee personally identifiable information (PII),” an FBI spokesperson told The Register. "While the point of breach is still undetermined - whether a third-party or the FBI’s enterprise - we are actively and aggressively investigating this matter and working closely with those third-party providers that support FBIJobs.gov to mitigate any and all risk." On Tuesday, the criminals told us that they broke into the bureau via yet another Oracle PeopleSoft zero-day flaw in the FBIJobs.gov portal, which remains down as of Friday. Then, they breached the FBI’s managed servers on AWS GovCloud and swiped thousands of personnel files belonging to current, former, and prospective FBI employees. “We hold very sensitive data on almost ALL FBI Agents and individuals who filed an application with the FBI for a job,” the group claimed in a message posted online and addressed to FBI Director Kash Patel and Brett Leatherman, assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division. Sample files reviewed by journalists and security researchers appear to contain agents’ home addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, Social Security numbers, job titles, assigned field office, and emergency contact information. 'We refuted the misinformation disseminated by the FBI' According to a spokesperson for ShinyHunters, the FBI hack isn’t about the money, and the crew did not demand a multimillion-dollar extortion payment to not leak the agents’ personal details. “Our breach of the FBI was executed specifically to contest the allegations made against ShinyHunters in their May 2026 FLASH report,” a spokesperson told The Register. The FBI bulletin, published soon after the group breached ed-tech giant Instructure's Canvas platform and claimed to have stolen data tied to hundreds of millions of students, teachers, and staff, said ShinyHunters uses “harassment strategies, sending threatening text messages and phone calls to victims and their family members, and in some cases, swatting.” The criminals, it continued, “may falsely claim to have sensitive or compromising information, including embarrassing photographs or videos of victims, which frequently do not exist.” ShinyHunters contends this is all false. By hacking the FBI and releasing its statement about the hack, “we demonstrated our technical capabilities and directly refuted the misinformation disseminated by the FBI, journalists, and industry researchers,” the spokesperson told us in an interview. “This was fundamentally a public relations and marketing initiative for our business,” they said. 'Results-driven professionals' or criminals? ShinyHunters said it believes that “future corporate partners we engage with for payment will review this documentation, reinforcing our reputation as serious, results-driven professionals focused solely on transaction and resolution.” Most people call these "future corporate partners" victim organizations, breached by the digital thieves, and threatened with data leaks unless they pay an extortion demand. The FBI intrusion “establishes our credibility, technical superiority and excellence, and capability with future corporate stakeholders, positioning us as a professional and predictable entity focused on concluding negotiations efficiently,” the spokesperson said. It also puts a huge target on the crew, and we’d bet that the FBI, already gunning to arrest ShinyHunters members, is now doubling down on those efforts. The spokesperson said they and others in the crew started off as GnosticPlayers before rebranding as ShinyHunters in 2020, and that they have since seen the “majority” of GnosticPlayers members arrested. This business, however, is a criminal operation. We asked them why they believe people will trust the words of criminals over those of law enforcement. They said it’s due to ShinyHunters’ “unique and exceptional reputation along with over five years of history in the space…We are in a unique position and due to our vast capabilities and resources, victims are more likely to resolve the situation quickly and cheaper with us instead of going down the full disclosure route.” Think of the children We also questioned how they justify doing what they do in this “business” - breaking into IT systems, stealing data, extorting victims - considering the personal toll it takes on people, especially when the stolen files contain sensitive information about children as they did in the Canvas intrusion. ShinyHunters claims that they “don't attack human beings. We attack the corporate structure. The Business. Not human beings. The money comes out of insurance pocket. Not people’s or businesses' own. Full coverage by insurance. No personal harm is being done, only business harm that they recover from within a quarter considering the type of attack.” Ransomware and other disruptive attacks are “substantially worse and costly,” they said. “There are times in the work we do sometimes we have to push the corporate to the absolute limit to get them on the table,” they continued, noting that there was an “initial issue” with the Canvas intrusion “that we cannot comment on, but it highly relates to the misinformation we are combating. It takes a lot of convincing to bring a corporate to the table to negotiate if they think you are not trustworthy and bluffing/exaggerating what you have.” While we don’t know for sure what this issue was, ShinyHunters switched to school-by-school extortion after compromising Instructure, the company that owns the Canvas online learning platform, in late April and after the initial pay-or-leak deadline passed on May 6. They injected a ransom message into about 330 Canvas school login portals, causing Instructure to take the platform offline for a day - during final exams and Advanced Placement testing for many. Meanwhile, that PeopleSoft 0day The ed-tech company ultimately “reached an agreement” with ShinyHunters, which is corporate-speak for they paid the extortion demand. Alliance Risk CEO David Vainer previously told The Register he estimates the figure sits somewhere between $5 million and $30 million. According to ShinyHunters, the PeopleSoft preauth vulnerability that they exploited in the FBI attack still doesn’t have a patch. Oracle hasn’t responded to The Register’s questions about the zero-day, or any plans for a patch. Shiny had “no comment” about whether the gang has abused the PeopleSoft bug to compromise other organizations. But they added: “the zero-day would allow us to access similar HR/Employee personal information for other corporations who are vulnerable.” They wouldn’t put a dollar amount on how much they earn from extorting businesses, but boasted: “our revenue performance significantly outperforms both our counterparts and legitimate real life businesses. We have reason to believe in a few months or soon an upcoming financial analysis or reports tracking our earnings will reflect substantial revenue growth.” And they would not comment when asked if they worried about getting arrested and criminally charged for their digital intrusions and extortion attacks. ®

Noteworthy stories that might have slipped under the radar: BragJack attack against browser AI assistants, TDengine flaw threatens industrial telemetry uptime, Ubuntu update overhaul. The post In Other News: Clop Leak Site Takeover, Docker Botnet Hunts AI Keys, Water Utility Exposure appeared first on SecurityWeek .

Docker has announced Docker Cloud Sandboxes, a new solution for secure, isolated AI agent execution that enables complex agentic workflows to continue running in the cloud long after a developer’s laptop shuts down. Launched at WeAreDevelopers North America, Docker Cloud Sandboxes let organizations run agentic workloads at scale without tying up developers’ hardware, provisioning their own infrastructure, or paying for unused capacity. Docker Cloud Sandboxes give developers a straightforward path to move their agentic workflows … More → The post Docker introduces OCI-based Kits to package agents and their guardrails appeared first on Help Net Security .

A new botnet malware called Carbonato is targeting insecure hosts running Docker daemons to install the Hermes Agent AI framework and take control. [...]

The ShinyHunters cybercriminal organization on Tuesday replaced agency images on the FBIjobs.gov site with a photo of a Pokemon that has become the group’s defacto mascot.

Extortion group ShinyHunters is not afraid to make enemies. Now it claims to have breached the FBI. After reportedly taking over ransomware group Clop’s leak site , ShinyHunters says it attacked the FBI to punish the agency for spreading what it calls false information about the group. In a very long post on its leak site, the group outlines its grievances: “ PSA – READ THIS NOW Dear Assistant Director Brett Leatherman of the FBI Cyber Division & Director Kash Patel of the FBI, During Quarter Two of this year the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) made substantial false allegations regarding our organisation in a FLASH report. We have been severely offended. We were very disappointed to see an agency of your standing would resort to such circulation of disinformation in an attempt to “disrupt” our operations, an effort that ultimately proved unsuccessful. For us to properly address and correct these unfounded allegations, we were compelled to adopt a forceful and assertive posture to ensure our response was fully acknowledged. This PSA today does just that. Our PSA today works to address these allegations and correct them. We have compromised the FBI. We hold very sensitive data on almost ALL FBI Agents and individuals who filed an application with the FBI for a job. Whether it be a Special Agent or any other role within your agency. The following FBI services were compromised: Criminal Justice (CJ), HR, Medlink, and more. We are willing to allow you a time of 1 week to correct or simply REMOVE the 2026 Quarter 2 FLASH report on us that includes several FALSE allegations: “Threat actors often use their real or exaggerated claims of access to sensitive or personal information to prompt payment from victims.” “To exert pressure on victims[1], SH actors commonly use harassment strategies, sending threatening text messages and phone calls to victims and their family members, and in some cases, swatting” “Threat actors may falsely claim to have sensitive or compromising information, including embarrassing photographs or videos of victims, which frequently do not exist.” We wish to state unequivocally our threats and claims are very real. Not exaggerated and never a bluff. This PSA today is living evidence of that. We wish to state unequivocally we have NEVER conducted swatting attacks against corporate victims personnel nor have we ever texted victims personnel family members any threats. We wish to state unequivocally we have NEVER claimed to have sensitive or compromising information, including embarrassing photographs and videos of victims. WE ARE NOT SEXTORTIONISTS. Finally, we wish to STATE UNEQUIVOCALLY we are NOT apart of “The Com”. We have NEVER been apart of “The Com”. “The Com” is a propaganda started by the Information Security Industry which has brainwashed past FBI and DOJ officials into formalising this nonsense. As a big believer and supporter of the U.S. Constitution – we are exercising the First Amendment and actively combating disinformation. This is not a ransom, coercion, or extortion. Your federal policies do not apply here. This PSA is NOT financially motivated. We recognise that certain statements within your FLASH report appear to stem from biased public reporting by certain journalists who have previously and intentionally propagated false narratives about our organisation in an attempt to “disrupt” our operations and hinder clients trust in our organisation hoping nobody pays us. Should those certain journalists and you know very well who you are, continue these unwarranted attacks and defamatory statements, we will be forced to respond in a civil manner with a commensurate and forceful defence of our reputation. We welcome any and all journalists to inquire us at shinygroup@onionmail[.]com to hear our side of the story. Make the right decision, don’t be the next headline. Thank you for your attention to this matter. -SH Updated: 23 Sep 2026 “ The post is essentially a hostile “correction notice” directed at FBI leaders Brett Leatherman and Kash Patel. Its central grievance is an FBI advisory that says ShinyHunters commonly harasses victims and their families, including through threatening messages, phone calls, and, in some cases, swatting. It also warns that threat actors may exaggerate their access to personal information or falsely claim to possess compromising photos or videos. The advisory does not use the word “sextortion,” but ShinyHunters appears to have interpreted the reference to compromising material that way. The group denies much of the FBI’s account while simultaneously using coercive language of its own. The document it appears to mean is the FBI/IC3 public advisory “ShinyHunters: Cyber Criminal Group Attacks Learning Management System,” issued on May 15, 2026. Despite ShinyHunters calling it a “2026 Quarter 2 FLASH report,” the publicly accessible document is labeled a Public Service Announcement (PSA), not a FLASH. The picture may have been further confused by a sextortionist who pretended to be ShinyHunters . ShinyHunters declares: “WE ARE NOT SEXTORTIONISTS.” It also denies carrying out swatting attacks or sending threatening messages to the family members of people working for its corporate victims. The group also denies being part of  The Com , a decentralized network linked to cybercrime and violence. It calls that connection: “propaganda started by the Information Security Industry which has brainwashed past FBI and DOJ officials into formalizing this nonsense.” The group then threatens journalists it accuses of spreading these “false narratives.” The most worrying part of the message is the group’s claim that it stole sensitive data on: “almost ALL FBI Agents, and ​individuals who filed an application with the FBI for a job.” According to 404 Media , ShinyHunters provided a sample containing information on roughly 5,000 FBI agents, including names, home addresses, phone numbers, and details about their spouses. The publication reportedly verified portions of the sample, but the full dataset and the wider claims about the breach have not been independently confirmed. The group also reportedly defaced the FBI’s jobs website. The FBI says it is aware of claims involving unauthorized activity affecting FBIjobs.gov and is investigating, although “broken” does not necessarily mean “breached.” What to do if you’re affected The FBI has not yet confirmed what information was accessed or who was affected. If you are a current or former FBI employee, a relative of one, or have applied for an FBI job: Check the FBI’s advice.  Every breach is different, so check FBI.gov for updates and follow any specific advice it offers. Change your password.  If you have an FBI Jobs account and reuse its password elsewhere, change it on those other accounts. Choose a  strong password  that you don’t use for anything else. Better yet, let a  password manager  choose one for you. Enable  two-factor authentication  ( 2FA ).  If you can, use a FIDO2-compliant hardware key, laptop, or phone as your second factor. Some forms of 2FA can be phished just as easily as a password, but 2FA that relies on a FIDO2 device can’t be phished. Watch out for impersonators.  Cybercriminals may contact you posing as the FBI, another government agency, or someone you know. Verify the identity of anyone who contacts you. Take your time.  Phishing attacks often impersonate people or brands you know and use themes that require urgent attention, such as missed deliveries, account suspensions, and security alerts. Set up  identity monitoring . This can alert you if your  personal information  is found being traded illegally online and help you recover afterward. Let’s face it, an incognito window can only do so much.     Breaches, dark web trading, credit fraud. Malwarebytes Identity Theft Protection  monitors for all of it, alerts you fast, and comes with identity theft insurance. 

Infamous threat group ShinyHunters claims to have personal information on thousands of FBI employees

The cybercrime group is unhappy with its description in an FBI report and threatens to leak stolen information.  The post ShinyHunters Claims FBI Hack, Demands Retraction of Threat Report appeared first on SecurityWeek .

The cyber extortion group known as ShinyHunters on Tuesday claimed it had breached the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and stolen data belonging to current and former employees at the agency. "We have compromised the FBI. We hold very sensitive data on almost ALL FBI Agents and individuals who filed an application with the FBI for a job," the group said in a statement posted on their dark

The ShinyHunters extortion gang claims it breached FBI systems using a new Oracle PeopleSoft zero-day vulnerability, gaining access to internal services and stealing sensitive data on employees and job applicants. [...]

ShinyHunters claims it hacked the FBI and stole more than 2 TB of employee data - and this time it’s personal. The gang wants the Feds to correct the record on how it operates. “This is NOT financially motivated,” a Shiny spokesperson told The Register. “We want the FBI to correct or retract their statements they made, which included substantial false allegations.” The FBI did not immediately respond to The Register’s request for comment. According to a ShinyHunters spokesperson, the extortion group exploited an Oracle PeopleSoft zero-day vulnerability on the FBI jobs webpage, which it says allowed remote code execution (RCE) on the servers. The group then defaced the website, replacing it with a “This site has been seized by ShinyHunters” banner and image shared with The Register. At press time, the site says it is “currently down for maintenance but will be back up soon!” ShinyHunters also claims it moved laterally from the compromised site onto the FBI’s managed servers on AWS GovCloud, and downloaded about 2 TB to 3 TB of data belonging to current, former, and prospective FBI employees. “We hold data on all FBI employees and applicants,” the spokesperson told us. ShinyHunters claims the compromised FBI services include human resources, MedLink, and Criminal Justice Information Services. Neither Oracle nor AWS immediately responded to our inquiries, including whether Oracle is aware of a PeopleSoft preauth RCE zero-day, and whether AWS has any insight into the alleged data theft. We will update this story if we receive any response. Unlike most of the group’s smash-and-grab operations that involve a multimillion-dollar ransom demand to not leak the stolen files, ShinyHunters said it isn't seeking an extortion payment from the FBI. Instead, it wants the federal cops to retract statements made about ShinyHunters in a May 15 bulletin, shortly after the gang broke into ed-tech giant Instructure's Canvas platform and claimed to have stolen data tied to hundreds of millions of students, teachers, and staff. The FBI said ShinyHunters uses “harassment strategies, sending threatening text messages and phone calls to victims and their family members, and in some cases, swatting.” The security alert also said that extortionists “may falsely claim to have sensitive or compromising information, including embarrassing photographs or videos of victims, which frequently do not exist.” Shiny claims none of this is true. “I have been doing my very best to combat these allegations,” they told us. “And this is the best way to do it.” ®

Il gruppo ShinyHunters ha hackerato il sito Onion del gruppo di ransomware Clop (noto anche come Cl0p). I membri di ShinyHunters affermano di aver rubato dati dal server, inclusi log, codice sorgente e chiavi private del servizio onion, e ora intendono chiedere un riscatto ai rapitori. Secondo quanto riportato da BleepingComputer , l’attacco è avvenuto nella serata di venerdì 18 settembre 2026. I rappresentanti di ShinyHunters hanno dichiarato ai giornalisti di aver trovato una vulnerabilità nel CMS che consente il caricamento non autenticato di file e di aver inizialmente caricato sul server di Clop un piccolo file di testo. In esso, gli hacker hanno scritto “pwn3d by ShinyHunters ” , hanno consigliato a Clop di non minacciarli più e hanno lasciato un link al loro sito. I giornalisti hanno confermato che questo file era effettivamente presente sul server di Clop e veniva scaricato direttamente dal sito Tor del gruppo. Poche ore dopo, ShinyHunters ha completamente sostituito il contenuto del sito: è apparsa un’immagine ASCII con il Pokémon Umbreon (Umbreon) , che il gruppo utilizza come logo, un link al sito ShinyHunters e un messaggio “ root ing your systems since ’19 ;)”. Si nota che la stessa immagine è stata utilizzata durante il deface di HackForums ad agosto 2020, per il quale i membri di ShinyHunters hanno anche rivendicato la responsabilità. I rappresentanti del gruppo hanno dichiarato di aver ottenuto “accesso completo” al server di Clop , di aver rubato il codice sorgente, i plugin di Grav CMS e altri file. Inoltre, gli attaccanti avrebbero estratto il contenuto di /var/log, dove potevano trovarsi log di sistema e di autenticazione, inclusi gli indirizzi IP degli utenti che si sono connessi al server. ShinyHunters afferma inoltre di aver rubato le chiavi private del servizio onion di Clop, il che significa che gli attaccanti potranno avviare un proprio server Tor con lo stesso indirizzo onion anche dopo che Clop avrà ripristinato il controllo sulla propria infrastruttura. Ora ShinyHunters stanno esaminando i dati ottenuti e dichiarano di ricattare Clop e di pianificare di pubblicare presto sul proprio sito la richiesta di riscatto . Gli hacker spiegano che quanto accaduto è una vendetta per un recente conflitto sorto tra i gruppi. Secondo la versione di ShinyHunters , la lite tra hacker è iniziata durante la campagna di Clop, mirata a Oracle E-Business Suite nel 2025. Ricordiamo che allora i rapitori sfruttavano diverse vulnerabilità, inclusa la vulnerabilità 0-day CVE-2025-61882 , e rubavano massicciamente i dati delle aziende. All’incirca in quel periodo, i membri del gruppo hacker Scattered Lapsus $ Hunters (che include ShinyHunters ) hanno pubblicato un exploit PoC di dominio pubblico. Come confermato in seguito da Oracle, questo PoC corrispondeva all’exploit utilizzato negli attacchi di Clop. All’epoca, in ShinyHunters affermavano che inizialmente quell’exploit apparteneva a loro e che un membro di Clop lo aveva ottenuto e utilizzato senza permesso. BleepingComputer scrive che dopo questo il conflitto tra criminali informatici si sarebbe aggravato: secondo l’affermazione di ShinyHunters , un rappresentante di Clop avrebbe minacciato di svelare le identità dei membri del gruppo e di vendicarsi fisicamente contro di loro. L'articolo Hacker contro Hacker! I Criminali di ShinyHunters hackerano Clop e li ricattano proviene da Red Hot Cyber .

ShinyHunters defaced Clop's Dark Web site and claims to have stolen victim data, potentially exposing organizations that paid ransoms to renewed extortion attempts.

The ShinyHunters extortion group hijacked the dark web leak site of the prolific Cl0p ransomware gang, according to material posted on the site over the weekend.

Clop has discovered what life is like on the receiving end of an extortion demand after rival crew ShinyHunters hijacked its leak site and demanded an eight-figure payout. The takeover surfaced over the weekend, when Clop's dark web leak site displayed a large "DOMAIN SEIZED BY SHINYHUNTERS" banner and the tagline "rooting your systems since '19 ;)." ShinyHunters told Reuters that it broke into the site on Friday by exploiting a vulnerability in the software powering it. The crew claimed this gave it extensive access to Clop's infrastructure. "We basically own them now," it said. Clop has not responded publicly, although two security researchers told Reuters that the clash appeared genuine. The Register has also viewed the defaced site, where ShinyHunters is posting increasingly colorful demands. According to ShinyHunters, the feud dates back to Clop's attacks on Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) customers last year. ShinyHunters claims it discovered the zero-day first, only for Clop to obtain the exploit and use it against corporate networks. It now wants a share of the proceeds. In a message posted on September 19, ShinyHunters demanded an eight-figure payment, claiming the sum represented 2.333 percent of its own net worth. A later update raised the demand to "all the money you made off the EBS campaign plus more AND WITH INTEREST." ShinyHunters also threatened to identify companies that allegedly paid Clop and publish the sums and Bitcoin addresses involved. ShinyHunters turned the screw again on September 21, warning that its demands would increase with every 24 hours that Clop failed to respond. It now also wants a public apology, because apparently having your dark web extortion site hijacked isn't embarrassing enough. Clop is one of the most prolific data extortion groups in cybercrime. The gang has spent years exploiting vulnerabilities in enterprise software to steal data and extort victims, most notoriously during the 2023 MOVEit campaign, which affected thousands of organizations and exposed information belonging to tens of millions of people. ShinyHunters has an extensive rap sheet of its own, having been linked to numerous large-scale data theft and extortion campaigns. Its latest target is rather more familiar with that business model than most. The potential damage to Clop goes beyond the defacement of its leak site. If ShinyHunters has the wider access it claims and publishes records of previous ransom payments, the fallout could extend to companies that believed paying Clop had kept their identities and negotiations private. For now, though, those claims remain unverified. There is also the small matter of Clop's reputation. Leak sites are intended to demonstrate that an extortion crew has both the stolen goods and control of its operation. Having yours hijacked by a rival and repurposed to demand money from you is not exactly a glowing advertisement. ShinyHunters says the price will continue rising every 24 hours until Clop responds. The extortionists have become the extorted. ®

ShinyHunters has claimed responsibility for hacking the Clop ransomware group, defacing its leak site and alleging theft of key operational data

Reportedly , the ShinyHunters extortion group breached the leak site of one of its competitors, the Clop ransomware gang. ShinyHunters is a financially motivated cybercrime and extortion group active since 2019. It is known for stealing large volumes of data and pressuring victims to pay, rather than necessarily deploying ransomware. One recent high-profile organization targeted by the group was Instructure, the maker of Canvas LMS. ShinyHunters claimed it stole 3.65 TB of data belonging to about 9,000 academic institutions . Clop, also written Cl0p, is a ransomware and data-extortion operation associated with large-scale exploitation of vulnerabilities in enterprise software and file-transfer platforms. In its recent campaign targeting PTC Windchill systems, it named more than 40 alleged victims, including Shell, Philips, Fiserv, Zebra Technologies, Ingersoll Rand, and Toast. At the time of writing, the Clop dark web leak site looks like this: Domain seized by ShinyHunters The rest of that page looks much the same as the ShinyHunters leak site, which includes this “Note to Cl0p”: “Note to Cl0p_- 21 Sep UPDATE: Every 24 hours you fail to engage with us the demands increase. The demand now includes a mandatory apology issued directly to me PUBLICLY . I am 3-0 against you rich and broke criminals. UPDATE, 20 Sep, 1:39 a.m ET: Dear Likhogray & Tarasov, tell your boss j0nny to wake the fuck up. Run those pockets. I want all the money you made off the EBS campaign plus more AND WITH INTEREST, before I start releasing information regarding the companies that paid you, how much, and to what Bitcoin address. My phone book contains all major financial media outlets. CLOCK IS TICKING! LETS GET THE BALL ROLLING! Be sure to bring an English interlocutor so you can comprehend my literacy in acquiring your bank account. 66 hours remaining. [19 Sep]: IF YOU WANT TO SAVE YOUR BRAND AND NOT DIE BY MY HANDS: Email us from your official email at [email protected] and lets see how wealthy you really are. 2.333% of my networth is a 8 figure amount, I hope you can pay that much because that is the demand, negotiable. Get your bosses in front of the white board in the war room. Clock is ticking moron. Kindly excuse our unprofessionalism. Updated: 21 Sep 2026” BleepingComputer reports that the attack began Friday night when ShinyHunters exploited what it claims is an unauthenticated file-upload vulnerability in Grav CMS to upload a small text file to Clop’s site. Several hours later, ShinyHunters told BleepingComputer that it had “completely defaced” the site. The group claimed it could continue controlling the address: “We have their onion keys. So, if they kick us out it wouldn’t matter at all because we control the private keys to host the same exact onion URL.” You might expect groups that make their money by exploiting unpatched vulnerabilities to be more vigilant about their own systems, but it looks as though they sometimes let their guard down. According to ShinyHunters, this gang war began after ShinyHunters disrupted a Clop data-theft campaign. A Clop representative then allegedly threatened to identify ShinyHunters members and made violent threats against them. ShinyHunters explained: “During the Oracle EBS campaign they ran and stole from me last year, someone from cl0p personally messaged me and said, and I quote (translated from Russian): I have more money than you and all of your people combined, I’ll kill you soon.” The good news is that while they are after each other, they probably have less time to attack legitimate businesses. I’m grabbing a bag of popcorn and watching this one unfold. We’ll keep you posted. From reporting threats to removing them. Cybersecurity risks should never spread beyond a headline. Keep threats off your devices by  downloading Malwarebytes today .

The ShinyHunters extortion gang breached the Clop (aka Cl0p) ransomware operation's data leak site, defacing the Tor site and allegedly stealing server data and the private keys for its onion service. [...]