GREENFIELD — Hancock Health paid Attack.Ransom a $ 55,000 ransom Attack.Ransom to hackers to regain access to its computer systems , hospital officials said . Part of the health network had been held hostage Attack.Ransom since late Thursday , when ransomware locked files including patient medical records . The hackers targeted more than 1,400 files , the names of every one temporarily changed to “ I ’ m sorry. ” They gave the hospital seven days to pay Attack.Ransom or the files would be permanently encrypted , officials said . An analysis since the attack confirmed no personal patient information was taken Attack.Databreach by the hackers , believed to be located in eastern Europe , said Hancock Health CEO Steve Long . The affected files were backed up and could have been recovered , but restoring them would take days — maybe even weeks — and would be costly , Long said . From a business standpoint , paying a small ransom Attack.Ransom made more sense , he said . The hacker asked for Attack.Ransom four bitcoins — a virtual currency used to make anonymous transactions that are nearly impossible to trace . At the time of the transfer , those four bitcoins were valued at about $ 55,000 .

PGA of America computers were infected this week with a strain of malicious software that locked down critical files and demanded Attack.Ransom cryptocurrency for their return . Officials discovered on Tuesday that servers had been targeted in a ransomware attack Attack.Ransom that blocked them from obtaining access to material relating to major golf tournaments , including this week ’ s PGA Championship at Bellerive Country Club . Some signage had been in development for over a year and could not be reproduced quickly , Golfweek reported . The extortion threat Attack.Ransom was clear : Transfer bitcoin to the hackers or lose the files forever . “ Your network has been penetrated . All files on each host in the network have been encrypted with a strong algorythm ( sic ) , ” a ransom read . “ Backups were either encrypted or deleted or backup disks were formatted. ” The note claimed shutting down the system may damage files . The notice included a bitcoin wallet number—where funds could be sent—and a warning that there was no way to get access to the files without a decryption key . The hackers that said they would prove their “ honest intentions ” to the PGA of America by unlocking two files free-of-charge . A source who asked not to be named told Golfweek that officials had no intention of paying the ransom demand Attack.Ransom —following the advice of most law enforcement officials and cybersecurity experts . The network remained locked on Wednesday and external researchers are still investigating . PGA of America has declined to comment . The golfing association did not reveal what ransomware infected its computers . But tech website Bleeping Computer found the demand matched the BitPaymer variant . Researcher Lawrence Abrams said one previous extortion Attack.Ransom scheme asked for Attack.Ransom 53 bitcoins , equivalent to $ 335,000 . Abrams described BitPaymer as a “ secure ransomware ” and said the PGA would either have to rely on backups to regain access to its files or pay Attack.Ransom the significant bitcoin demand Attack.Ransom .

Austrian police arrested a 19-year-old teenager from Linz for infecting the network of a local company with the Philadelphia ransomware . The incident in question took place last year and targeted an unnamed company based in Linz . The attacker locked the company 's servers , including its production database . The attacker asked for Attack.Ransom $ 400 to unlock the company 's systems , but the victim refused and instead recovered its data via older backups . Attack traced back to Linz teenager The company filed a criminal complaint with the Austrian Federal Criminal Police Office ( Bundeskriminalamt , or BK ) , claiming damages of €3,000 due to production losses . An investigation by Austrian police 's SOKO Clavis unit tracked down the attack to a Linz teenager . Authorities searched the suspect 's homes , one in Linz , and one near Vienna , where he moved . Police arrested the young man , who was later released and is now under an official investigation . According to a BK spokesperson , the teenager denied all accusations . Teenager bought ransomware off the Dark Web Investigators believe the suspect bought the Philadelphia ransomware off the Dark Web . The ransomware is currently on sale on the AlphaBay Dark Web marketplace starting with $ 389 . The ransomware appeared in September 2016 and was based on the Stampado ransomware . Emsisoft released a free decrypter for Philadelphia a day after the ransomware first appeared . According to a Forcepoint report published today , Philadelphia is also the tool of choice for ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom against the healthcare sector . Austrian police are also investigating ( cached mirror ) another ransomware attack Attack.Ransom that targeted an Austrian hotel . In late January , a ransomware attack Attack.Ransom at an Austrian hotel affected the electronic door locking system at an Austrian hotel . At the time of publishing Bleeping Computer could not confirm with Austrian police that this was the same attack they started investigating in mid-March .

Although Robert Herjavec , an investor on ABC 's `` Shark Tank , '' expects the price of bitcoin to `` skyrocket , '' he has no plans to personally buy any . That 's because as the CEO of cybersecurity firm Herjavec Group , he does n't want to support the growing trend of hackers using cryptocurrency . `` I ca n't invest in something that my enemy uses as funds , '' he explained on CNBC 's `` Squawk Alley . '' Indeed , `` If there was no cryptocurrency , much of the large hacks that we 're seeing today would n't exist , '' Herjavec told Money . As one example , Herjavec is concerned with the role cryptocurrency plays in ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom . `` Cryptocurrency permits anonymity , '' he explains to CNBC Make It . `` It 's a very popular form of payment for ransomware in particular . '' Ransomware is a type of software that locks or encrypts a computer user 's data and files , in affect holding it hostage . To release the information , a hacker will demand a ransom payment Attack.Ransom . Ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom increased 6,000 percent in 2016 from 2015 , according to a study from IBM Security . And in 2017 , 200,000 computers in 150 countries belonging to businesses , governments and even the U.K. National Health Service were impacted Attack.Ransom by the ransomware virus known as WannaCry . In that case , victims were told to make a payment Attack.Ransom in bitcoin to get their computers back . Hackers often demand the ransom Attack.Ransom be paid in cryptocurrency because it allows them to remain anonymous , Herjavec says . `` I can take over your computer or personal information , hold it for ransom Attack.Ransom , give you instructions on how to create a virtual wallet , force Attack.Ransom you to pay Attack.Ransom me , and you have no way of finding out who I am , '' Herjavec explains . That 's because a bitcoin wallet is only identified by a number , and `` payments are direct without a bank or credit card company acting as the middle man , '' Herjavec says . `` There is no money trail , so it 's very difficult to track back to an individual . '' With WannaCry , the hackers asked for Attack.Ransom $ 300 worth of bitcoin from victims , and if they waited over 72 hours to pay Attack.Ransom , the fine increased to $ 600 . If they waited a week , their information would be locked for good . The Trump administration pointed to North Korea as the originator of the attack . In 2016 , ransomware was used to coerce Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center , a hospital in Los Angeles , to pay Attack.Ransom 40 bitcoin to hackers , The New York Times reports . That sum was then worth $ 17,000 . Bitcoin closed at $ 10,779.90 on Tuesday , March 6 , according to CoinMarketCap , which makes those 40 coins worth about $ 431,196 . To protect yourself from ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom , take steps to secure your online information . `` Keep your computer and data safe by backing up often , using cloud services with dual factor authentication and complex passwords , '' Herjavec suggests . `` Have anti-virus [ software ] installed and kept up to date . ''

A new ransomware strain named Ryuk is making the rounds , and , according to current reports , the group behind it has already made over $ 640,000 worth of Bitcoin . Attacks Attack.Ransom with this ransomware strain were first spotted last Monday , August 13 , according to independent security researcher MalwareHunter , who first tweeted about this new threat . There have been several reports from victims regarding infections with Ryuk in the past week , including one on the Bleeping Computer forums . But despite these reports , security researchers from various companies have not been successful at identifying how this ransomware spreads and infects victims . The common train of thought is that this ransomware spreads via targeted attacks , with the Ryuk crew targeting selected companies one at a time , either via spear-phishing emails or Internet-exposed and poorly secured RDP connections , albeit researchers have not been able to pinpoint the exact entry vector for infections as of yet . `` According to what we can see right now , it seems the attacks are targeted , i.e . a result of some manual compromise , '' Mark Lechtik , a Check Point security researcher , told Bleeping Computer in a private conversation today . `` Reason for this is that the malware needs Admin privileges to run , which it does n't achieve on its own . Something else that executes it had to achieve this privilege , '' he added . `` But no artifact was found to show what spawned the execution of the malware ( i.e . no mail , document , script etc. ) . '' Ryuk shuts down over 180 services on infected hosts But there are also some differences . The main one , spotted by both Check Point and MalwareHunter is that Ryuk comes with a huge list of apps and services it shuts down before infecting a victim 's systems . `` The ransomware will kill more than 40 processes and stop more than 180 services by executing taskkill and net stop on a list of predefined service and process names , '' Check Point researchers explained in a report . The ransom note conundrum Furthermore , Ryuk 's targeted nature is never more obvious than when it comes to its ransom notes . Check Point says it found several Ryuk samples where the ransomware dropped Attack.Ransom different ransom notes on users ' systems . Researchers found a long , more verbose ransom note , and another , blunter and to-the-point ransom demand Attack.Ransom . Both ransom notes asked Attack.Ransom victims to contact the Ryuk authors via email . Coincidentally or not , the ransom fees demanded Attack.Ransom via the longer and more detailed ransom note were higher ( 50 Bitcoin ~ $ 320,000 ) , compared to the shorter ransom note , where crooks asked for Attack.Ransom a smaller amount of money ( 15-35 Bitcoin , ~ $ 224,000 ) . `` There seems to be some adaptation made in the ransom notes , '' Lechtik told Bleeping Computer , suggesting this particular detail adds up to the assumption that Ryuk is deployed after hackers infect networks and not via mass email spam . `` This could imply there may be two levels of offensive , '' Check Point said , suggesting that the Ryuk gang may also deploy different Ryuk samples based on the organization they manage to infect , and their ability to pay higher ransom fees Attack.Ransom . Ryuk not decryptable at the time of writing As for the ransomware 's encryption , this is a classic AES-RSA combo that 's usually undecryptable unless the Ryuk team made mistakes in its implementation . Currently , researchers have not spotted such weakness in Ryuk , as of yet . Similar to most elite ransomware strains , unique Bitcoin payment addresses are created for each victim . Check Point says that money does n't stay too much in these addresses , and they are quickly split and laundered through different accounts . While previous versions of the Hermes ransomware have been an on-and-off threat that surfaces at random intervals with a mass spam campaign , the new Ryuk ransomware strain appears to be a new attempt from the Lazarus Group at developing a SamSam-like strain to use in precise surgical strikes against selected organizations .

The Colorado Department of Transportation ( DOT ) has shut down over 2,000 computers after some systems got infected with the SamSam ransomware on Wednesday , February 21 . The agency 's IT staff is working with its antivirus provider McAfee to remediate affected workstations and safeguard other endpoints before before reintroducing PCs into its network . DOT officials told local press [ 1 , 2 ] that crucial systems were not affected , such as those managing road surveillance cameras , traffic alerts , message boards , and others . The agency 's Twitter feed continued to show traffic alerts after the agency shut down much of its employees ' IT network . Colorado DOT will not pay the ransom Attack.Ransom In a rare sign of transparency , officials revealed the name of the ransomware —SamSam . This is the same ransomware strain that infected hospitals , city councils , and ICS firms in January . The hackers made over $ 300,000 from those attacks . One of the victims , an Indiana hospital agreed to pay Attack.Ransom a $ 55,000 ransom demand Attack.Ransom despite having backups . Hospital officials said it was easier and faster to pay the ransom Attack.Ransom than restore all its computers ' data from backups . DOT officials said they do n't intend to follow suit by paying the ransom demand Attack.Ransom and they will restore from backups . SamSam ransomware making a comeback The SamSam ransomware is a ransomware strain that 's been deployed by a single group . Infection occurs after attackers gain access to a company 's internal networks by brute-forcing RDP connections . Attackers then try to gain access to as many computers on the same network as possible , on which they manually run the SamSam ransomware to encrypt files . In the recent campaigns , SamSam operators usually asked for Attack.Ransom a 1 Bitcoin ransom Attack.Ransom and left a message of `` I 'm sorry '' on victims ' computers . The SamSam group had been previously active in the winter of 2016 but have come back with new attacks . These new attacks have been detailed in reports published by Bleeping Computer , Secureworks , and Cisco Talos .

The city of North Bend , Ore. , was hit with a ransomware attack Attack.Ransom which temporarily locked out city workers from their computers and databases . “ One weekend morning a few weeks back all of our servers and things locked up , and we received a ransomware note that asked for Attack.Ransom $ 50,000 in Bitcoin these people would provide us with the code to unlock our computer systems , ” North Bend City Administrator Terence O ’ Connor told The World . Fortunately the city ’ s IT systems were backed up and officials were able to avoid the high ransom demanded Attack.Ransom by the criminals responsible for the attack Attack.Ransom . City officials did , however , call in the FBI to investigate the attack and while they were unable to identify anyone directly involved in the attack , they were able to trace the ransom demand Attack.Ransom to Romania . O ’ Connor added that the attack appeared to be a more sophisticated ransomware where there are two keys needed to unlock your system with one planted in the system and the other is held by the culprit . The city was insured and ended up having to pay Attack.Ransom around $ 5,000 in out of pocket expenses as well as added a firewall security to prevent future attacks .

East Ohio Regional Hospital in Harper 's Ferry , Ohio , and Ohio Valley Medical Center in Wheeling , West Virginia , both got affected by ransomware on the last weekend of November . [ 1 ] Due to this incident , ambulance patients were transported to other hospitals nearby and emergency room admissions were limited to walk-up patients only . Due to attack , employees needed to switch to paper charting and various systems were taken offline immediately . This fairly quick response limited the ransomware damage and prevented the possible data breach Attack.Databreach . [ 2 ] According to Karin Janiszewski , director of marketing and public relations for EORH and OVMC , hospitals reacted as soon as possible and , at the moment of writing , they are already using the computer network . On the following Saturday , Karin Janiszewski stated : There has been no patient information breach Attack.Databreach . The hospitals are switching to paper charting to ensure patient data protection . We have redundant security , so the attack was able to get through the first layer but not the second layer . IT staff dealt with the outbreak to avoid a data breach Attack.Databreach When it comes to malware attacks on large companies , the loss Attack.Databreach of personal customer data is the worst thing that can happen . It seems that this time the situation was handled quick enough to prevent having the sensitive data being compromised Attack.Databreach . IT team took several computers offline , and , because of this , most of the clinical operations transferred to other units , and emergency patients were automatically taken to different locations . On Saturday , when the incidents occurred , hospital officials stated that the staff is ready to take everything on paper until the downtime is over . Also , since this is a ransomware-type malware attack Attack.Ransom , hackers demand a ransom Attack.Ransom . However , officials did not select the scenario involving making the payment Attack.Ransom . No matter how big or how little the ransom demand Attack.Ransom is , officials should n't even consider making the payment Attack.Ransom because it may lead to system damage or permanent data loss . [ 3 ] In the United States , data breaches Attack.Databreach and malware attacks on huge organizations have become a common thing , especially in the healthcare industry . In 2016 Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital paid the demanded ransom Attack.Ransom in Bitcoin after having its data encrypted . [ 4 ] The infection was widespread and the attack Attack.Ransom cost around $ 17 000 . Another incident that resulted in ransom payment Attack.Ransom was spotted in Kansas Heart Hospital in 2016 also . Unfortunately , after the payment was made Attack.Ransom , attackers disappeared ignoring the promise to decrypt locked files . They send yet another ransom demand Attack.Ransom instead and asked for Attack.Ransom a bigger amount of money . Previously this year , the Indiana-based hospital got infected with SamSam which is an infamous ransomware virus which has been relying on specific infection tactics which is highly personalized . After considering different scenarios , the hospital decided to pay Attack.Ransom 4 BTC ( equal to $ 45 000 at that time ) for ransomware developers to get private keys needed for files ' recovery . Ransomware developers gave what they promised .

`` There have not been any breaches Attack.Databreach in any of Apple 's systems including iCloud and Apple ID , '' an Apple representative said in an emailed statement . `` The alleged list of email addresses and passwords appears to have been obtained Attack.Databreach from previously compromised Attack.Databreach third-party services . '' A group calling itself the Turkish Crime Family claims to have login credentials for more than 750 million icloud.com , me.com and mac.com email addresses , and the group says more than 250 million of those credentials provide access to iCloud accounts that do n't have two-factor authentication turned on . The hackers want Apple to pay Attack.Ransom $ 700,000 -- $ 100,000 per group member -- or `` $ 1 million worth in iTunes vouchers . '' Otherwise , they threaten to start wiping data from iCloud accounts and devices linked to them on April 7 . In a message published on Pastebin Thursday , the group said it also asked for Attack.Ransom other things from Apple , but they do n't want to make public . `` We 're actively monitoring to prevent unauthorized access to user accounts and are working with law enforcement to identify the criminals involved , '' the Apple representative said . `` To protect against these type of attacks , we recommend that users always use strong passwords , not use those same passwords across sites and turn on two-factor authentication . '' However , the unusually high numbers advanced by the group are hard to believe . It 's also hard to keep up with the group 's claims , as at various times over the past few days , it has released conflicting or incomplete information that it has later revised or clarified . The group claims that it started out with a database of more than 500 million credentials that it has put together over the past few years by extracting Attack.Databreach the icloud.com , me.com and mac.com accounts from stolen databases its members have sold Attack.Databreach on the black market . The hackers also claim that since they 've made their ransom Attack.Ransom request public a few days ago , others have joined in their effort and shared even more credentials with them , putting the number at more than 750 million . The group claims to be using 1 million high-quality proxy servers to verify how many of the credentials give them access to unprotected iCloud accounts . Apple provides two-factor authentication for iCloud , and accounts with the option turned on are protected even if their password is compromised Attack.Databreach . The latest number of accessible iCloud accounts advanced by the Turkish Crime Family is 250 million . That 's an impressive ratio of one in every three tested accounts . The largest ever data breach Attack.Databreach was from Yahoo with a reported 1 billion accounts . `` At best they ’ ve got some reused credentials , but I wouldn ’ t be surprised if it ’ s almost entirely a hoax . '' Hunt has n't seen the actual data that the Turkish Crime Family claims to have , and there is n't much evidence aside from a YouTube video showing a few dozen email addresses and plain text passwords . However , he has significant experience with validating data breaches Attack.Databreach and has seen many bogus hacker claims over the years . To be on the safe side , users should follow Apple 's advice and create a strong password for their account and turn on two-factor authentication or two-step verification at the very least

A group calling itself XMR Squad has spent all last week launching DDoS attacks against German businesses and then contacting the same companies to inform them they had to pay Attack.Ransom €250 ( $ 275 ) for `` testing their DDoS protection systems . '' German DDoS protection firm Link11 reported attacks against DHL , Hermes , AldiTalk , Freenet , Snipes.com , the State Bureau of Investigation Lower Saxony , and the website of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia . The attack Attack.Ransom against DHL Germany was particularly effective as it shut down the company 's business customer portal and all APIs , prompting eBay Germany to issue an alert regarding possible issues with packages sent via DHL . `` They seem to know what to hit , '' said Daniel Smith , security researcher for Radware , and one of the persons currently keeping tabs of the attacks . The group sent emails to all the companies it targeted . In the emails , they did n't ask for a ransom Attack.Ransom to stop the attacks Attack.Ransom , but a fee for having already carried out what they called a DDoS protection test . Usually , these types of groups launch DDoS attacks and then send emails to their victims requesting for payments Attack.Ransom to stop the attacks Attack.Ransom . XMR Squad 's emails looked like invoices for unrequested DDoS tests . Furthermore , the ransom note did n't include payment instructions , which is weird , to say the least . DDoS ransoms Attack.Ransom are usually handled in Bitcoin or another anonymous cryptocurrency . It was strange to see the group ask for payment Attack.Ransom in Euros , as the group 's name included the term XMR , the shortname for Monero , an anonymous cryptocurrency . While the group advertised on Twitter that their location was in Russia , a German reporter who spoke with the group via telephone said `` the caller had a slight accent , but spoke perfect German . '' To the same reporter , the group also claimed they carried out the attacks only to get public attention . The attention they got was n't the one they expected , as their hosting provider took down their website , located at xmr-squad.biz . Germany , in particular , has been the target of several DDoS blackmailers in the past year . In January and February , a group calling itself Stealth Ravens launched DDoS-for-Bitcoin ransom attacks Attack.Ransom . Link11 , who tracked those attacks Attack.Ransom , claimed the group used a DDoS botnet built with the Mirai IoT malware and asked for Attack.Ransom 5 Bitcoin ( $ 6,000 ) to stop attacks Attack.Ransom . Last year in June , another group named Kadyrovtsy also targeted German businesses , launching attacks Attack.Ransom of up to 50 Gbps . This group began DDoS ransom attacks Attack.Ransom a month earlier by first targeting Polish banks . All these groups are following the same modus operandi perfected by groups like DD4BC and Armada Collective . These two groups appeared in the summer and autumn of 2015 and targeted companies worldwide . In January 2016 , Europol arrested suspects believed to be DD4BC members in Bosnia and Herzegovina . Following the arrests , both groups became inactive . After the demise of these two main groups , there was a wave of copycats [ 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 ] that used their respective reputation to extort payments Attack.Ransom from companies , in many cases without even possessing any DDoS capabilities .

Ransomware , a special version of trojan that encrypts files , has become a new and tremendously growing type of cybercrime . The 2016 Ransomware Report released by 360 Security Center lately presents that : – 4.9 million computers were attacked in China – 56,000 ransomware infections worldwide only in March 2016 – $ 1 billion dollar source of income for cyber criminals estimated by FBI – Almost half of organizations have been hit with ransomware In January 2016 , three Indian banks ’ and a pharmaceutical company ’ s computer systems were infected Attack.Ransom by ransomware . The attacker asked for Attack.Ransom 1 bitcoin ( about $ 905 ) for each infected computer , and then used unprotected desktop interface to infect other connected computers from remote . These corps lost several million dollars due to the huge number of infected computers . February 5th 2016 , Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center paid Attack.Ransom a $ 17,000 ransom Attack.Ransom in bitcoin to a hacker who seized control of the hospital ’ s computer systems and would give back access only when the money was paid Attack.Ransom . Two hospitals in Ottawa and in Ontario were attacked by ransomware later on . In February 2016 , several schools ’ computer systems were attacked by ransomware . The hacker took control of the intranet and servers , and asked for Attack.Ransom 20 bitcoin . These school ended up paying Attack.Ransom the anonymous hacker $ 8,500 to get their IT systems back . In the mid-February , a new ransomware “ Locky ” started to spread out via email . 7 out of 10 malicious email attachments delivered Locky in Q2 2016 . Once users activated the file attached in the email , their files were encrypted and had to pay Attack.Ransom the distributor a certain ransom Attack.Ransom to decrypt these files . May 2016 , a series of ransomware attacks on the House of Representatives have led US congress to ban using Yahoo Mail and Google hosted-apps , and warned their members about being caution of Internet security . In October , 2016 , 277 ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom were reported to Government Computer Emergency Response Team in Hong Kong , China . Most of the malware were hidden in email attachments and disguised as Attack.Phishing bills or receipts to trick Attack.Phishing users to click . The victims included the Marine Department of Hong Kong and Deloitte , one of the biggest accounting firms in the world . In November 2016 , other than emails , Locky began to transmit through social networks such as Facebook , LinkedIn with images contained malicious application . The file could be automatically downloaded while users were browsing , and installed once users clicked to check . November 2016 , San Francisco public transportation system Muni was hacked and requested for Attack.Ransom a $ 73,000 ransom Attack.Ransom in bitcoin to get back encrypted data . SFMTA ( The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority ) refused to pay Attack.Ransom the ransom Attack.Ransom and shut down the fair system . We can see that ransomeware is terrifying and collecting money illegally around the world . However , it ’ s almost impossible to decrypt the infected files by yourself , even for people with high information technology skills .

Ransomware , a special version of trojan that encrypts files , has become a new and tremendously growing type of cybercrime . The 2016 Ransomware Report released by 360 Security Center lately presents that : – 4.9 million computers were attacked in China – 56,000 ransomware infections worldwide only in March 2016 – $ 1 billion dollar source of income for cyber criminals estimated by FBI – Almost half of organizations have been hit with ransomware In January 2016 , three Indian banks ’ and a pharmaceutical company ’ s computer systems were infected Attack.Ransom by ransomware . The attacker asked for Attack.Ransom 1 bitcoin ( about $ 905 ) for each infected computer , and then used unprotected desktop interface to infect other connected computers from remote . These corps lost several million dollars due to the huge number of infected computers . February 5th 2016 , Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center paid Attack.Ransom a $ 17,000 ransom Attack.Ransom in bitcoin to a hacker who seized control of the hospital ’ s computer systems and would give back access only when the money was paid Attack.Ransom . Two hospitals in Ottawa and in Ontario were attacked by ransomware later on . In February 2016 , several schools ’ computer systems were attacked by ransomware . The hacker took control of the intranet and servers , and asked for Attack.Ransom 20 bitcoin . These school ended up paying Attack.Ransom the anonymous hacker $ 8,500 to get their IT systems back . In the mid-February , a new ransomware “ Locky ” started to spread out via email . 7 out of 10 malicious email attachments delivered Locky in Q2 2016 . Once users activated the file attached in the email , their files were encrypted and had to pay Attack.Ransom the distributor a certain ransom Attack.Ransom to decrypt these files . May 2016 , a series of ransomware attacks on the House of Representatives have led US congress to ban using Yahoo Mail and Google hosted-apps , and warned their members about being caution of Internet security . In October , 2016 , 277 ransomware attacks Attack.Ransom were reported to Government Computer Emergency Response Team in Hong Kong , China . Most of the malware were hidden in email attachments and disguised as Attack.Phishing bills or receipts to trick Attack.Phishing users to click . The victims included the Marine Department of Hong Kong and Deloitte , one of the biggest accounting firms in the world . In November 2016 , other than emails , Locky began to transmit through social networks such as Facebook , LinkedIn with images contained malicious application . The file could be automatically downloaded while users were browsing , and installed once users clicked to check . November 2016 , San Francisco public transportation system Muni was hacked and requested for Attack.Ransom a $ 73,000 ransom Attack.Ransom in bitcoin to get back encrypted data . SFMTA ( The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority ) refused to pay Attack.Ransom the ransom Attack.Ransom and shut down the fair system . We can see that ransomeware is terrifying and collecting money illegally around the world . However , it ’ s almost impossible to decrypt the infected files by yourself , even for people with high information technology skills .

Hackers have been trying to blackmail Attack.Ransom patients of a Lithuanian plastic surgery clinic , by threatening to publish their nude “ before and after ” photos online . The photos were stolen Attack.Databreach earlier this year , along with other sensitive data – passport scans , national insurance numbers , etc – from the servers of Grozio Chirurgija , which has clinics in Vilnius and Kaunas . According to The Guardian , the stolen data was first offered for sale in March . At that time , the hackers , who call themselves “ Tsar Team , ” released a small portion of the database to prove the veracity of their claims and to entice buyers . They asked for Attack.Ransom 300 bitcoin for the entire lot , and at the same time contacted some of the affected patients directly , offering to delete the sensitive data for a sum that varied between €50 and €2,000 ( in bitcoin ) . Apparently , among the patients of the clinic were also celebrities , both Lithuanian and not , and individuals from various European countries , including 1,500 from the UK . It is unknown if any of them paid the ransom Attack.Ransom , but the clinic did not try to buy back the stolen data . Instead , they called in the Lithuanian police , CERT and other authorities to help them prevent the spread of the data online , and to find the culprits . They ’ ve also asked the affected patients to notify the police if they got a ransom request Attack.Ransom from the hackers ; to notify news portals , forums or social networking sites of any links to the stolen data that may have been published in the comments on their sites and ask them to remove them ; and do the same if they find a link through Google Search . In the meantime , the hackers decided to leak Attack.Databreach online over 25,000 of the private photos they have stolen Attack.Databreach , more than likely in an attempt to force the affected patients ’ hand and get at least some money . It ’ s interesting to note that the name of the hacker group – Tsar Team – is also a name that has been associate with the Pawn Storm attackers ( aka APT28 , aka Sofacy ) , a Russian cyberespionage group that has targeted a wide variety of high-profile targets , including the NATO , European governments , the White House , and so on . It is unclear , though , if this is the same group . Given that it is a very unusual target for APT28 , it ’ s possible that these attackers have simply used the name to add weight to their demands .

Lost evidence includes all body camera video , some in-car video , some in-house surveillance video , some photographs , and all Microsoft Office documents . Data from that period backed up on DVDs and CDs remained intact . While archived data has its importance , more worrying is that the department lost data from ongoing investigations . In an interview with WFAA , who broke the story , Stephen Barlag , Cockrell Hill 's police chief , said that none of the lost data was critical . The department also notified the Dallas County District Attorney 's office of the incident . The department says the infection was discovered on December 12 , last year , and the crooks asked for Attack.Ransom a $ 4,000 ransom fee Attack.Ransom to unlock the files . After consulting with the FBI 's cyber-crime unit , the department decided to wipe their data server and reinstall everything . Data could not be recovered from backups , as the backup procedure kicked in shortly after the ransomware took root , and backed up copies of the encrypted files . According to the department 's press release , the Cockrell Hill police IT staff said they were infected with the OSIRIS ransomware . It 's quite possible that the department 's server was infected with the Locky ransomware , which a few days prior had come out with a new version that appended the `` .osiris '' extension at the end of encrypted files . The press release says the infection took place after an officer opened a spam message from a cloned ( spoofed ) email address imitating Attack.Phishing a department issued email address . The infection did not spread to other computers because the server was taken offline and disconnected from the local network as soon as staff discovered the ransom demand Attack.Ransom . The department also said there was no evidence of data exfiltration Attack.Databreach to a remote server .