In a rather shocking move, the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department recently confirmed that they had paid a staggering $1.1 million ransom to hackers following a severe cyberattack on their computer systems in early April. The ransomware attack forced the department to shut down essential systems, including email, in-car computers, and a few law enforcement databases, one of which was used for background checks.
Paying ransom to hackers is something we rarely see, especially involving law enforcement agencies. The FBI's longstanding advice to victims of such attacks is not to pay the ransom. The risks involved are high - not knowing who you're paying to, the funds potentially ending up in the hands of sanctioned entities or terrorist organizations, and of course, the embarrassment of a law enforcement agency having to pay off criminals.
However, San Bernardino County decided to go against this advice and paid slightly less than half of the total ransom, with the rest covered by their insurance carrier. This decision was unusual, even considering the trend where nearly half of state and local governments hit by ransomware in 2022 decided to pay the hackers. Few of them were as high profile as San Bernardino County.
The hackers, believed to be tied to a network of Russian hacking operations, targeted the Sheriff's Department and demanded an untraceable payout. This incident is part of a concerning trend where public institutions, including cities, school districts, and hospitals, are falling victim to ransomware attacks. These institutions are often less protected than major companies and house vast amounts of sensitive data, making them attractive targets for cybercriminals.
Now, here's the twist in the tale. After paying the ransom and getting their database returned, the San Bernardino County officials discovered something disturbing. The returned database had been extensively edited by AI systems. The hackers filled the database with fake cases, using the stolen personal information of the county's residents and artificially generated data.
This revelation raises several alarming questions: what did San Bernardino County really pay for? A decryption key? A promise that stolen data would be destroyed? Or a database that had been manipulated by AI and filled with fake cases? The answers to these questions are currently unclear, and the aftermath of this attack is still under investigation.
This incident serves as a stark reminder of the potential dangers and ethical dilemmas posed by ransomware attacks. It's imperative that we strengthen our cyber defenses, improve our response strategies, and establish clearer policies regarding ransom payments.
Can’t really find the link again because I was in incognito but holy crap; how do they pay for a fake database?!
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from hacking: security in practice https://ift.tt/sE4onyd
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