Operation ENDGAME and the Battle for Initial Access by Lucie Cardiet

Europol’s Operation ENDGAME conducted three coordinated takedowns (May 2024, May 2025, Nov 2025) that dismantled botnet and initial‑access infrastructure used to deliver dropper malware and enable ransomware operations—seizing over 1,000 servers, thousands of domains, and €21M+ in cryptocurrency while making multiple arrests. The report stresses that disruption is temporary, attackers rebuild quickly (often using legitimate cloud services), and SOCs must adopt continuous, behavior‑driven detection across network, identity, and cloud to catch attacker techniques rather than relying on static indicators.