Tom Westerholm reports: A hacker who goes by the screen names “netsaosa” and “g0retrance” got into the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA) website on Monday and posted “pwned,” briefly derailing the release of the MIAA’s official statewide brackets for state tournament games. Reporters noted the delay before MassLive.com’s Meredith Perri realized the site was compromised. A pop-up in…
Author: Dissent
KS: Company that dumped private records in public trash is fined
AP reports: A national company will pay nearly $500,000 in fines for improperly disposing of documents that contained personal information of clients, the Kansas Attorney General’s Office said. Attorney General Derek Schmidt sued SearchTec, which has a satellite office in Kansas, in 2017. Read more on Lexington Herald-Leader. From the Kansas Attorney General’s Office: TOPEKA…
BlackMatter ransomware says its shutting down due to pressure from local authorities
Catalin Cimpanu reports: The criminal group behind the BlackMatter ransomware have announced plans today to shut down their operation, citing pressure from local authorities. The group announced its plan in a message posted in the backend of their Ransomware-as-a-Service portal, where other criminal groups typically register in order to get access to the BlackMatter ransomware strain. Read…
Schools across the nation are getting hit with ransomware attacks—but they won’t admit how much it’s costing them
Grace Ferguson reports: When the personal information of students and employees at Fairfax County Public Schools showed up on the dark web in October 2020, the Virginia school district had been in a standoff with hackers for nearly a month. Even with help from the FBI, Virginia State Police, and a hired cybersecurity firm, the district…
The ‘Groove’ Ransomware Gang Appears to Have Been a Hoax — But Was Any of It Real?
Brian Krebs writes: A number of publications in September warned about the emergence of “Groove,” a new ransomware group that called on competing extortion gangs to unite in attacking U.S. government interests online. It now appears that Groove was all a big hoax designed to toy with security firms and journalists. You can read more…
South Carolina School District reports security incident
Sarah Coble reports: A school district in South Carolina is investigating a “cyber-incident” that it says impacted hundreds of staff computers. On October 4, some of the networks of Colleton County School District stopped operating. The unusual activity was detected by the district’s information technology staff, who determined that a cybersecurity incident had occurred. Read more on InfoSecurity. From…