Japanese police have captured a Russian national believed to be a key member of the “Qilin” international hacker group and extradited him to Germany, investigative sources said Tuesday. Qilin is believed to have carried out ransomware attacks against companies worldwide, causing major damage through data encryption. In 2025, the group claimed responsibility online for a major system outage at Japanese food and beverage company Asahi Group Holdings.
According to the sources, German authorities had been searching for the Russian man suspected of involvement in a ransomware attack targeting a German company. After receiving information that the suspect was in Japan, Japanese authorities located and detained him and handed him over to Germany at the German side’s request. According to Japan’s National Police Agency, 123 ransomware attacks were confirmed in the first half of 2026, setting a new half-year record high.
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