Former Conti member “Tramp,” now known as “Devman,” added to Interpol’s wanted list

Former Conti figure known online as “Devman” has been added to Interpol’s wanted list, with authorities identifying Oleg Evgenievich NEFEDOV as the ringleader behind the Black Basta ransomware and the group’s founder.

According to The Public Prosecutor General’s Office in Frankfurt am Main – Central Office for the Suppression of Internet Crime (ZIT) and the German Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt), NEFEDOV is suspected of forming a foreign criminal organisation and involvement in a particularly serious case of extortion, with alleged leadership of the Black Basta operation and the decision on targets, recruitment, ransom negotiations and the use of extorted funds.

The group has been active since at least the beginning of 2022 and has used multiple malware programmes to infiltrate systems, steal data and encrypt them to demand cryptocurrency payments for decryption. The police say the person charged is believed to have extorted more than 100 companies in Germany and around 600 worldwide, and his current whereabouts are unknown, with a possibility that he is living in the Russian Federation. Interpol issued a Red Notice for NEFEDOV.