WannaCry Ransomware Sold in the Middle Eastern and North African Underground

For $50, one could purportedly get a lifetime license to upgradeable variants of WannaCry. We saw this advertisement in an Arabic-speaking underground forum on May 14, two days after WannaCry’s outbreak. Indeed, a threat that left a trail of significant damage in its wake was objectified into a commodity, and even a starting point for others to launch their own cybercriminal businesses.

WannaCry’s relatively low price also reflects another unique aspect of the Middle Eastern and North African underground: a sense of brotherhood. Unlike marketplaces in Russia and North America, for instance, where its players aim to make a profit, the Middle East and North Africa’s underground scene is an ironic juncture where culture, ideology, and cybercrime meet.