November 9, 2024

A year-long international investigation has resulted in the arrest of the suspected head of the SilverTerrier cybercrime group by the Nigeria Police Force.

“The suspect is alleged to have run a transnational cybercrime syndicate that launched mass phishing campaigns and business email compromise schemes targeting companies and individual victims,” Interpol said in a statement.

Operation Delilah, as the coordinated international effort is called, involved tracking the 37-year-old Nigerian man’s physical movements, before he was apprehended at Murtala Mohammed International Airport in Lagos.

Singapore-headquartered cybersecurity company Group-IB said it provided threat intelligence that led to the arrest as part of the police operation that commenced in May 2021.

The development is the third in a series of law enforcement actions aimed at the identification and arrest of the suspected members of the SilverTerrier gang (aka TMT).

In November 2020, three alleged members of the group were arrested for compromising at least 500,000 government and private sector companies in more than 150 countries since 2017. This was followed by the arrests of 11 more members earlier this year as part of an operation dubbed Falcon.