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The US government has charged<\/a> a dual Russian and Israeli national with allegedly building and maintaining LockBit\u2019s malware code, while receiving over $230,000 in cryptocurrency for his work. The 51-year-old Rostislav Panev was arrested in Israel pending extradition to the US, making him the third member of the LockBit ransomware group in custody.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Authorities are still searching for Lockbit\u2019s alleged ringleader, Dmitry Khoroshev<\/a>, with a reward worth up to $10 million. The DOJ claimed in May<\/a> that \u201cKhoroshev alone allegedly received at least $100 million in disbursements of digital currency through his developer shares of LockBit ransom payments,\u201d based on a 20 percent share of ransom payments extorted by affiliates who used the group\u2019s software.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Law enforcement linked Panev to LockBit after finding login credentials on his computer for a dark web repository housing \u201cmultiple versions of the LockBit builder,\u201d which is the tool that allowed members \u201cto generate custom builds of the LockBit ransomware malware for particular victims.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Panev allegedly admitted to writing and maintaining LockBit\u2019s malware code in interviews with the Israeli police. Some of the code he\u2019s said to have created can disable Windows Defender antivirus software, run malware on multiple computers on a network, and print LockBit\u2019s ransom note on all the printers in a victim\u2019s network. Panev claimed he didn\u2019t realize he was involved in illegal activity at first, according to the complaint.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n