Ransomware Intelligence / Groups / 3am

Ransomware group

3am

3AM, also known as ThreeAM, is a relatively new ransomware family that emerged in late 2023, initially deployed as a fallback option when LockBit infections failed. Written in Rust for 64-bit systems, it appends the “.threeamtime” extension to encrypted files and tags them with the marker “0x666,” while deleting Volume Shadow Copies to hinder recovery. 3AM operators use a double extortion strategy, combining file encryption with data theft and threats to leak stolen information. More recent campaigns have shown increased sophistication, incorporating email bombing followed by vishing calls to convince victims to grant remote access via Microsoft Quick Assist. Attackers then deploy virtual machines containing backdoors, allowing them to remain undetected while exfiltrating data before attempting to launch the ransomware payload.

  • 0claims, 7 days
  • 0claims, 30 days
  • 11claims, 90 days
  • 2026-05-01first seen
  • 2026-10-06last seen

These are claims posted by the group on its leak site, counted when we first see them. They are not confirmed incidents, and we never name a victim.

Activity, last 26 weeks

New leak-site claims per week.

Week of 2026-05-11: 0Week of 2026-05-18: 0Week of 2026-05-25: 0Week of 2026-06-01: 0Week of 2026-06-08: 12Week of 2026-06-15: 0Week of 2026-06-22: 1Week of 2026-06-29: 1Week of 2026-07-06: 1Week of 2026-07-13: 1Week of 2026-07-20: 0Week of 2026-07-27: 0Week of 2026-08-03: 1Week of 2026-08-10: 0Week of 2026-08-17: 1Week of 2026-08-24: 1Week of 2026-08-31: 0Week of 2026-09-07: 0Week of 2026-09-14: 0Week of 2026-09-21: 1Week of 2026-09-28: 7Week of 2026-10-05: 1Week of 2026-10-12: 0Week of 2026-10-19: 0Week of 2026-10-26: 0Week of 2026-11-02: 0
Claims per week, oldest to newest. Each bar is a full Monday-to-Sunday week; the newest bar is the current week so far.

In the news

Recent stories in the security press that name 3am, newest first.

Headlines are shown as the publisher wrote them and link to the original story. They are third-party reporting, not SecuritySnares findings. How stories are picked

Countries claimed, last 90 days

  1. United States 4
  2. Argentina 1
  3. Australia 1
  4. Colombia 1
  5. Germany 1
  6. United Kingdom 1
  7. MD 1
  8. Mexico 1

Vulnerabilities 3am exploits

Our sources do not attribute specific vulnerabilities to 3am .

70% of successful ransomware attacks use remote encryption (Microsoft, 2024): files on protected servers are encrypted over the network from a device the attacker controls. Read our remote encryption briefing →

Newest vulnerabilities used by any ransomware group (CISA KEV)
Added CVE Vendor / product Vulnerability
2026-08-18 CVE-2026-59310 Broadcom VMware vCenter Broadcom VMware vCenter Path Traversal Vulnerability
2026-08-05 CVE-2026-63077 JetBrains TeamCity JetBrains TeamCity Deserialization of Untrusted Data Vulnerability
2026-07-29 CVE-2026-20316 Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center (FMC) Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center Use of Hard-coded Password Vulnerability
2026-07-14 CVE-2026-15410 SonicWall SMA1000 Appliances SonicWall SMA1000 Appliances Code Injection Vulnerability
2026-07-14 CVE-2026-15409 SonicWall SMA1000 Appliances SonicWall SMA1000 Appliances Server-Side Request Forgery Vulnerability
2026-07-01 CVE-2026-45659 Microsoft SharePoint Server Microsoft SharePoint Server Deserialization of Untrusted Data Vulnerability
2026-06-25 CVE-2026-12569 PTC Windchill and FlexPLM PTC Windchill and FlexPLM Improper Input Validation Vulnerability
2026-06-12 CVE-2026-35273 Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise PeopleTools Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise PeopleTools Missing Authentication for Critical Function Vulnerability

Tactics and techniques

MITRE ATT&CK techniques reported for 3am by Ransomware.live, in attack order.

Persistence
Privilege Escalation
Defense Evasion
Discovery
Exfiltration
Impact

Data sources: CISA KEV, Ransomchats, RansomLook, Ransomware.live, security news outlets · updated 12 hours ago

Sector, country and ransom-demand figures are SecuritySnares estimates made with a language model. Leak-site listings are claims by threat actors and are not independently verified; leak-site victims are never named unless they have disclosed the incident themselves. News headlines are the publishers' own reporting, shown as written and linked to the original. Methodology