http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/01/m...ud-site-wares/

MegaSearch’ Aims to Index Fraud Site Wares

A new service aims to be the Google search of underground Web sites,
connecting buyers to a vast sea of shops that offer an array of dodgy
goods and services, from stolen credit card numbers to identity
information and anonymity tools.

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I can't quite figure out what the actual URL is for this "Megasearch"
portal.

The story mentions this url: http://megasearch.cc/

But all attempts to access "megasearch.cc" point back to
krebsonsecurity.com

This gives an interesting result: http://megasearch.cc/index.html

It seems likely that the owner of megasearch.cc has pointed his domain
back to krebsonsecurity to deflect the heat the story has created.
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A glut of data breaches and stolen card numbers has spawned dozens of
stores that sell the information. The trouble is that each shop
requires users to create accounts and sign in before they can search for
cards.

Enter MegaSearch.cc, which lets potential buyers discover which fraud
shops hold the cards they’re looking for without having to first create
accounts at each store. This free search engine aggregates data about
compromised payment cards, and points searchers to various fraud shops
selling them.

According to its creator, the search engine does not store the
compromised card numbers or any information about the card holders.
Instead, it works with card shop owners to index the first six digits of
all compromised account numbers that are for sale. These six digits,
also known the “Bank Identification Number” — or BIN — identify which
bank issued the cards. Searching by BIN, MegaSearch users are given
links to different fraud shops that are currently selling cards issued
by the corresponding bank.

I first read about this offering in a blog post by RSA Fraud Action
Research Labs. It didn’t take much time poking around a few hacker
boards to find the brains behind MegaSearch pitching his idea to the
owners of different fraud shops. He agreed to discuss his offering with
me via instant message, using the search service as his screen name.

“I’m standing on a big startup that is going to be [referred to as] the
‘underground Google,’” MegaSearch told KrebsOnSecurity. “Many users
spend a lot of time looking [through] shops, and I thought why not make
that convenient?”

The service currently indexes compromised BINs from five different card
shops, although he said several more shops are close to completing their
integration with MegaSearch. He acknowledged garnering a small
advertising fee for each relationship, although he repeatedly declined
to discuss the particulars of those arrangements. But he said both sides
benefit: stolen card data grows less reliable with age, and fraud shops
that are indexed by MegaSearch stand a better chance of clearing their
inventory faster, the hacker argues.

MegaSearch said that when his site first launched at the end of 2011 and
began indexing the five card shops he’s now tracking, those shops had
some 360,000 compromised accounts for sale, collectively. Since then,
those shops have moved more than 200,000 cards. The search engine
currently has indexed 352,000 stolen account numbers that are for sale
right now in the underground.

According to BIN search stats published on the site, Citibank cards are
the most sought-after, followed by cards issued by FIA Card Services,
Capital One and Chase.

In the coming weeks, he said, the site will include new features that
index other types of criminal wares, including Social Security numbers
and proxies — addresses of hacked PCs that paying clients can use as a
relay to anonymize their online communications.

“I’m about to add more services to that site that would help newbie
underground, including proxies, stolen identity information, etc.,”
MegaSearch told me. “I’m also going to add a survey [to rate] the best
shop.”

2011 has been called the Year of the Data Breach. If services like
MegaSearch are indicative of a trend, 2012 may well become known as the
year the criminal underground started getting a clue about how to better
index and use all of its stolen data.