AP reports: Officials at a St. Louis health center that serves needy, uninsured residents says a cyber-attack has caused a data breach that potentially affected 152,000 people. The Betty Jean Kerr People’s Health Center said Friday that the attack involved patient information such as addresses and social security numbers, but no patient medical records. Information…
Category: Malware
City of Johannesburg hit by ransomware, again
Catalin Cimpanu reports: A hacker group going by the name of Shadow Kill Hackers has infected the city of Johannesburg’s internal network with ransomware and is holding South Africa’s largest city for ransom. The hackers are demanding 4 bitcoins to be paid by next Monday, October 28, 5 pm, local time, or they claim they’ll…
Vietnamese student behind Android adware strain that infected millions
Catalin Cimpanu reports: ESET researchers have tracked down the author of a recent wave of Android adware to a university student living in Hanoi, Vietnam. The student is the author of at least 42 Android apps that have been uploaded on the official Google Play Store. The apps, installed more than eight million times, contained…
Cluley: “Frankly, sometimes paying the ransom is a good idea”
I usually don’t link to podcasts, but this one was especially good, I thought, as an analysis of what happened in Baltimore’s ransomware incident. And I am glad to hear Graham say what I have said a number of times: “Sometimes paying the ransom is a good idea.” You can hear the podcast here. I…
Ransomware Hits B2B Payments Firm Billtrust
Brian Krebs reports: Business-to-business payments provider Billtrust is still recovering from a ransomware attack that began last week. The company said it is in the final stages of bringing all of its systems back online from backups. With more than 550 employees, Lawrence Township, N.J.-based Billtrust is a cloud-based service that lets customers view invoices, pay, or…
Ransomware attack cripples San Bernardino City Unified School District’s computer system
KABC reports that as of yesterday, the San Bernardino City Unified School District was still having issues gaining access to its computer network after it was hit in a ransomware attack. A pop-up message was displaying on the district’s website, which stated that student and parent data was secure, school phone lines are working, but…