Nefilim is a ransomware group that emerged in May 2020, operating as a financially motivated cybercriminal organization that has targeted at least 15 documented victims across multiple sectors. The group's origin and specific affiliations remain largely undocumented by major security firms, though their operational patterns suggest they function as an independent ransomware operation rather than a confirmed Ransomware-as-a-Service model. Nefilim employs double extortion tactics, stealing sensitive data from victims before deploying their ransomware payload, and threatens to publish exfiltrated information on leak sites if ransom demands are not met, with their attacks primarily focusing on critical manufacturing, media, transportation systems, and communications sectors. The group has demonstrated a geographic targeting preference for Germany, France, New Zealand, and Australia, suggesting either regional operational focus or specific victim selection criteria within these countries. Due to the limited public documentation from major threat intelligence providers, detailed information about specific high-profile campaigns, attack vectors, and current operational status remains sparse in open-source reporting from established security research organizations. The group has been linked to 15 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on May 5, 2020; most recent post September 9, 2021. The operation is currently inactive.
If your organisation is affected
A listing by Nefilim means Elliott Group / Cascade Engineering / Unitex Textile Rental Services. Teaser. appeared on a ransomware extortion site and data attributed to it has been published. If this is your organisation, or a supplier you depend on, the priority is to confirm the intrusion and contain it before the window to act closes.
- Engage your incident-response team and preserve forensic evidence before remediating — do not wipe affected systems first.
- Force a password reset and revoke active sessions for exposed accounts; rotate any credentials, API keys or certificates that may have been in the stolen data.
- Assess regulatory notification duties (GDPR, NIS2, sector regulators) — many carry a 72-hour reporting clock from awareness.
- Monitor for the data appearing on Nefilim's leak site and across paste and breach channels, and brief downstream partners who may be exposed through you.
How we know this. Darkfield monitors public ransomware leak sites continuously, archiving every new disclosure and the data later released against the victim. Each entry on this page is sourced from the operator's own publication and cross-checked against complementary OSINT feeds (RansomLook, ransomware.live, RansomWatch). We do not collect or host stolen data — only the metadata, timestamps and screenshots needed to make the public disclosure searchable and accountable. Records here are corrected when the original post is edited, retracted, or merged with another disclosure.
