The report explains how authorities are currently "reviewing" the site's "backend data" and inviting victims and anyone with information about cybercriminal activity on BreachForums to contact the FBI via Telegram, email, or the web.

The site was seized just days after a hacker offered data for sale on BreachForums, claiming it had been stolen during a breach of a Europol web portal.

Was the takedown of BreachForums timed because the data stolen from Europol was a breach too far?

Until this week, BreachForums operated openly as a marketplace for criminals to trade stolen access devices, means of identification, hacking tools, breached databases, and other illegal services. The site, run by the ShinyHunters hacking group, was set up in June 2023, a month after its previous incarnation was disrupted by the arrest of its creator and administrator, Conor Brian Fitzpatrick (also known as "pompompurin").

The 21-year-old Fitzpatrick was sentenced in January to time served and 20 years of supervised release, banned from using the internet for the first year, and required to have monitoring software installed on his computer.

Fitzpatrick had created BreachForums after its predecessor, RaidForums, was shut down in April 2022, and its alleged administrator Diogo Santos Coelho arrested.

Do you notice a trend? Hacking marketplaces are disrupted, their alleged administrators arrested, and then new versions of the forums spring up to fill the void.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if someone replicates the BreachForums marketplace, providing a forum for cybercriminals to trade stolen data illegally. But anyone participating in such sites should think very carefully. Law enforcement agencies have a history of seizing data from criminal marketplaces like these and scouring it for details, which could lead to identifying their users.