Avaddon

Avaddon is a financially motivated ransomware group that emerged in early 2021, conducting targeted attacks primarily against organizations in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, and Australia. The group operated as a Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) model, recruiting affiliates to conduct attacks while the core operators maintained the ransomware infrastructure and negotiated with victims. Avaddon employed double extortion tactics, exfiltrating sensitive data before deploying their encryption payload and threatening to publish stolen information on their leak site if ransom demands were not met. The group typically gained initial access through phishing emails, exploited vulnerabilities in remote access services, and used legitimate administrative tools to move laterally within compromised networks. Over its operational period, Avaddon targeted critical infrastructure sectors including energy, government, finance, manufacturing, and transportation, successfully compromising at least 146 documented victims. The group's activities were significantly disrupted in June 2021 when the operators voluntarily shut down their operations and provided decryption keys for all victims to law enforcement, making Avaddon one of the few ransomware groups to cease operations without direct law enforcement takedown action.