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# VPNFilter botnet disruption

May 2018, State sponsored
Led by [Federal Bureau of Investigation](https://takedownindex.org/organizations/federal-bureau-of-investigation)

Extended pass entry, last reviewed August 21, 2026

What was taken down?

Domain seized; infected-device contacts redirected to FBI-controlled infrastructure, allowing victim IP addresses to be passed to remediation partners such as Shadowserver.

[See what happened](#what-happened)

What happened to the people?

No individual outcomes are recorded against this entry.
Group accounted for: Not applicable

[See people and accountability](#people)

Did it stay down?

Not established in the public record. No later activity is recorded against this entry.

[See what happened afterward](#afterward)

## What happened

A W.D. Pennsylvania court authorized the FBI to seize a domain used in VPNFilter's command-and-control and reinfection mechanism, targeting malware that had compromised networking devices worldwide.

**Date:** May 2018

**Target:** VPNFilter (attributed to Russia-linked Sandworm), botnet

**Activity:** State sponsored

**Operational lead:** FBI

**Partners**

Shadowserver[[1]](#source-1)

- [The Shadowserver Foundation](https://takedownindex.org/organizations/the-shadowserver-foundation), technical partner

**Jurisdiction:** Not established

**Outcome:** Domain seized; infected-device contacts redirected to FBI-controlled infrastructure, allowing victim IP addresses to be passed to remediation partners such as Shadowserver.

**Status:** Completed

**Legal mechanism:** Court-authorized domain seizure (W.D. Pa.)

**Group accounted for:** Not applicable

### Infrastructure

1 domain seized.

| Identifier | Recorded as | Status | Notes |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Not published | 1 domain | Seized, United States | Domain used in the VPNFilter C2/reinfection mechanism.[[1]](#source-1) |

Domains and onion addresses are shown defanged. Where the record gives a count but no identifier, the count is shown in place of one. This list carries only what appears in the cited sources.

## People and accountability

No individual is named against this entry in the cited record. That is a gap in what has been published rather than a finding that nobody was involved.

Group accounted for: Not applicable

The cited record does not say how large the group was or whether everyone involved has been identified.

[See the organizations and roles behind this action](https://takedownindex.org/takedowns/vpnfilter-botnet-disruption/organizations)

## What happened afterward

Not established in the public record. No later activity is recorded against this entry.

## Sources

Numbered markers throughout this entry link to the source that supports the claim beside them.

### Official sources

1.
[VPNFilter botnet C2 domain seizure](https://takedownindex.org/sources/us-doj-usao-wdpa-vpnfilter-botnet-c2-domain-seizure)

US DOJ / USAO WDPA, May 23, 2018, Source grade P1

Establishes the court-authorized domain seizure and redirection used to disrupt VPNFilter.

No address recorded for this source. Publisher, title, and date are given so it can be retrieved from the publisher.

Coverage note. Added from deep-research aggregation pass. Not independently re-verified source-by-source to the same standard as the original 38-incident core; source\_quality capped at S2/P2 pending a dedicated verification pass.

Research context

## How this entry was checked

This entry came from a broader aggregation pass and has not been independently verified source by source. Its sources are graded no higher than P2 or S2, and most carry no address yet. Treat the figures as a research lead rather than a settled record.

Source review: Extended pass, not yet verified

Sources cited: 1

Research cutoff: August 20, 2026

Last reviewed August 21, 2026

See also

[About the Internet Takedown Index](https://takedownindex.org/about)

Related entries

- [Backpage.com seizure](https://takedownindex.org/takedowns/backpage-com-seizure)
- [Operation Trojan Shield](https://takedownindex.org/takedowns/operation-trojan-shield)
- [3ve ad-fraud botnet disruption](https://takedownindex.org/takedowns/3ve-ad-fraud-botnet-disruption)

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