HOPE Conference 2020 VIDEO: Pricing and Mapping the Underground

Pricing and Mapping the Underground: HOPE 2020

Flare Systems’s David Hétu had the pleasure of speaking at H.O.P.E. (Hackers On Planet Earth) on July 31st this year on pricing and mapping the cybercrime underground.

Watch the On-Demand Recording Now!

Hackforums are known as the script kiddie forum of hacking where most up and coming hackers drift to. Past investigations have shown, however, that many established hackers are still very much active on the platform and use it to transact illicit goods and services. This presentation builds on the contract section of the forum that has archives going back over one year. This contract section provides detailed information on the transactions that hackers have negotiated over Hackforums. Using tens of thousands of contracts scraped from Hackforums, David will provide an analysis of the true cost of hacking tools and services, not those advertised publicly on the forum. He will conduct social network analysis of the actors involved in the transaction of illicit goods and services to identify key players and map the structure of the social organization of the illicit trades facilitated by Hackforums. 

This presentation will provide new and solid evidence of the inner workings of the underground illicit economy, as well as provide a methodology to identify key players in hacker networks based on the best practices of the social network analysis field.

About the Speaker

David Hétu Chief Research Officer at Flare Systems

As Director of Research, David leads scientific research operations at Flare Systems. A PhD in criminology from the Université de Montréal, he focuses his research on illicit markets on the internet and the darknet. His findings, published in over 40 articles over the last 10 years, have provided insights into the structure and inner workings of the criminal underground.

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Eric Clay

Marketing Director

Eric Clay has a strong cybersecurity background and significant experience building marketing approaches for SaaS companies. Clay began their career at a B2B marketing agency as an outside consultant for inbound lead gen processes in the cybersecurity and SaaS space and later became CMO at two cybersecurity startups. As Flare’s Marketing Director, Clay works with our marketing team to set and improve marketing strategies and approaches.

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