The Associated Press reports German police have shut down a datacentre installed in a former NATO bunker-- one hosting sites dealing with illegal activities such as drug sales and child pornography.
The former military bunker is found in Traben-Trarbach, a town on the Mosel River in W. Germany. Dubbed the "CyberBunker," the datacentre promised "bulletproof" hosting for illegal services. One such service was "Wall Street Market," a criminal marketplaces selling drugs, stolen financial data and hacking tools that was taken down earlier this year. Furthermore, the datacentre was used in a 2016 DDoS attack on Deutsche Telekom that knocked out around 1 million customers' routers.
The bunker covers 5000-square-metres and has a total of 5 floors, and was converted in a facility housing over 200 servers and office spaces for the people operating the datacentre. It is apparently the successor to the first CyberBunker, a datacentre in the Netherlands that was discovered by the authorities a hidden drug lab housed in the same facility caught fire, at least according to security reporter Brian Krebs.
The arrests took place in a restaurant in town and in Schwalback, outside Frankfurt. In total 13 people were arrested, including 3 Germans and 7 Dutch citizens, and the investigation also involved searches in the Netherlands, Poland and Luxembourg. As well as the arrests, German police reportedly seized up $41 million in funds tied to the aforementioned illegal services.
Go Germany Shuts Down Illegal Datacentre in Former NATO Bunker
Go German Cops Raid “Cyberbunker 2.0,” Arrest 7 in Child Porn, Dark Web Market Sting (Kreb on Security)
