According to a Kaspersky report that examined 200,000 job ads posted on 155 dark websites between March 2020 and June 2022, hacking and APT groups primarily seek to hire software developers with extremely competitive pay packages.
Kaspersky’s analysts found the highest-paying job to be $20,000 per month, while ads for capable attack specialists paid up to $15,000 per month. The median pay for IT professionals ranged between $1,300 and $4,000 per month, with designers earning the lowest pay and reverse engineers earning the highest.
Data analysts, malware and tool developers, initial compromise actors, reverse engineers, website and phishing email designers, malware testers, and IT administrators are among the positions that were advertised.
Recruiters offered full-time employment in one-third of the job postings, and an equal percentage allowed for a flexible schedule. In other cases, remote workers would be given paid vacation and sick leave, demonstrating that some dark web employers are concerned with making their offers as appealing as possible.
These compensation packages are quite competitive when compared to similar positions in legal job markets, and they may appeal to unemployed professionals or young IT graduates who are having difficulty finding work.
The sources for this piece include an article in BleepingComputer.