Disclosure context

About Darkrace

Darkrace is a relatively new ransomware group that emerged in May 2023, operating with primarily financial motivations through targeted extortion campaigns. The group demonstrates a preference for targeting European nations, particularly Italy, Sweden, and Portugal, while also conducting operations against victims in Japan and Switzerland, suggesting a broad international scope despite their limited scale of operations. With only 10 documented victims since their emergence, Darkrace appears to operate as a smaller, independent ransomware operation rather than a large-scale Ransomware-as-a-Service enterprise, though specific details regarding their country of origin and potential affiliations with other cybercriminal groups remain undocumented in public threat intelligence reporting. Due to the limited public documentation from major cybersecurity firms and law enforcement agencies regarding Darkrace's specific attack methodologies, encryption techniques, and initial access vectors, their operational tactics and technical capabilities are not well-established in current threat intelligence databases. The group has not been associated with any major, high-profile ransomware incidents that have drawn significant public attention or law enforcement response, likely due to their relatively small victim count and recent emergence in the threat landscape. Current intelligence suggests Darkrace remains active as of late 2023, though their limited operational footprint and absence from major cybersecurity advisories indicates they represent a lower-tier threat compared to more established ransomware operations. The group has been linked to 10 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on May 31, 2023; most recent post June 9, 2023. The operation is currently inactive.

Timeline of this disclosure

June 4, 2023hep global GmbH listed by Darkraceon the group's public leak site

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Energy & Utilities sector, which has 6 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, hep global GmbH is reported in Japan, a country with 108 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

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.

Ransomware victim disclosure

← All victims

hep global GmbH

Claimed by Darkrace · listed 3 years ago

36m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

Listed
Jun 4, 2023
Data leaked

At a glance

Group: Darkrace
Status: Data leaked
Country: Japan
Sector: Energy & Utilities
Listed on leak site: Jun 4, 2023

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

hep global GmbH is a German-headquartered company founded in 2008 that develops, builds, operates, and finances solar parks worldwide. The company has developed large-scale photovoltaic facilities with a combined capacity of approximately 1,310 MW peak and operates 18 solar projects from offices in Germany, Japan, and the USA. Its active pipeline for future projects comprises around 5,300 MW peak.

Industry: Solar Energy Development & Finance
Founded: 2008

Attack summary

Severity: high — Data has been published (disclosed status: data_published) by the threat actor against a renewable energy infrastructure company with international operations, indicating confirmed exfiltration of significant business data. The energy sector and scale of operations elevate the impact, though no regulated PII or medical data is explicitly confirmed.

Darkrace claims to have exfiltrated data from hep global GmbH and has published the data. No specific ransom demand or data size was stated in the post.

high

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Corporate financial data
Solar project documentation
Operational project records
Business pipeline information

What the group claims

A partner for everything to do with solar energy. That’s hep. Since 2008. We develop, build, operate and finance solar parks. World-wide. For energy production that can do more than supply electricity. The large-scale photovoltaic facilities we have developed have a capacity of around 1,310 MW peak. From our sites in Germany, Japan and the USA we operate 18 solar projects ourselves. Our active pipeline for future projects comprises around 5,300 MW peak. (The number of solar parks in operation are up to date. All the other figures are updated every six months.)

Sources

Victim sitehep.solar
Leak posthttp://wkrlpub5k52rjigwxfm6m7ogid55kamgc5azxlq7zjgaopv33tgx2sqd.onion/7c999bdcabdd/

Source

Indexed 3 years ago

This page surfaces a public ransomware disclosure indexed by Darkfield. Original posts come from the operator's own leak site; we cross-check against ransomware.live, RansomLook and RansomWatch where applicable. Share this URL freely.