The East Netherlands Cybercrime Team has executed a major operation, seizing thousands of servers from a rogue hosting company in the Netherlands. This company was intentionally designed to support large-scale cybercrime, having been linked to over 80 investigations worldwide since 2022, according to Dutch police. The provider marketed itself as “bulletproof,” promising users complete anonymity and explicitly stating it would not cooperate with law enforcement. Cybercriminals rely on such services to run illegal operations, including ransomware attacks, phishing, botnet control, financial fraud, and the distribution of child sexual abuse material, while avoiding shutdowns and legal action. During the coordinated operation on November 12, authorities seized about 250 physical servers in data centers in The Hague and Zoetermeer, immediately taking thousands of hosted virtual machines offline.
Investigators stated that the primary goal of the takedown was to disrupt active cybercrime networks globally that depended on this critical infrastructure. By dismantling the hosting company, authorities aim to prevent further victimization and cut off resources essential for launching cyberattacks. Bulletproof hosting services intentionally differ from legitimate providers by ignoring abuse complaints, concealing customer identities, and hosting malicious content like command-and-control servers and phishing sites. This makes them key enablers for organized cybercrime groups, ransomware affiliates, and dark web marketplaces.
Law enforcement agencies from several countries collaborated on the investigation, sharing digital evidence and intelligence to map the full scope of the criminal network. The seized servers contain vast amounts of logs, configurations, and communication data that could directly lead to the identification of the operators and customers involved in numerous criminal schemes.
Forensic specialists are now processing this massive dataset to uncover links to known threat actors and active malware infrastructures. Analyzing this information is the top priority for authorities and is expected to take considerable time. This critical data could expose the full scope of the illegal activities that the hosting provider facilitated.
The successful takedown represents a significant blow to the cybercrime ecosystem, as it deprives criminals of a trusted service that provided layers of anonymity and non-cooperation to conceal illegal operations. This operation highlights the increasing importance of international cyber enforcement efforts and the strategic focus on dismantling infrastructure providers that enable global digital crime.
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