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Malware and hacking in the real world: Police infected with ransomware
Technology users have heard time and again that they must protect themselves against the activities of cybercriminals. Whether it's encouraging the use of encryption or stronger passwords, many individuals aren't clueless about data protection.
However, experts can give information safety advice until they're blue in the face without getting the message across to some people. For these users, only real-world examples illustrating the importance of robust cybersecurity planning will suffice. To help communicate the message, here is a recent real life example of how malware infections and hacking can impact an organization, even one known for protecting others.
Police recover from "virtual stick-up"
According to NBC News contributor Julianne Pepitone, law enforcement officials in new Hampshire are currently picking up the pieces after their systems were infected with malware. Pepitone describes the attack as a 'virtual stick-up,' as the strain utilized was a type of ransomware called Cryptowall, which locks users out of their files and demands payment for their safe return.
While experts are still investigating, staff members at the Durham, New Hampshire police department are convinced that the infection came as a result of ransomware. The sample in question, Cryptowall, is a variant of the widespread CryptoLocker malware that began making the rounds last year.
On June 6, officers began noticing that individuals throughout the police station were having difficulties accessing the department's file system, NBC News stated. The organization responded immediately, calling upon the town's information technology manager, Luke Vincent, for help. Vincent took all workstations at the location offline and was able to isolate the infection later that night.
After a brief examination, officials came to the conclusion that the attack began the day before, when an officer opened an email that he thought was a communication from a known associate. However, the message contained a link which the officer clicked, and unknowingly downloaded Cryptowall onto the department's system.
Refusing to pay ransom
In these types of attacks, victims receive a notification demanding that they pay a ransom to have their files unlocked and returned. TechWorld noted that while officials did not specify the amount demanded, conventional ransomware attacks usually ask for $500 to $1000 in digital currency. Oftentimes, though, individuals pay the ransom and do not see a resolution. For this reason, Vincent recommended that officers not pay the amount asked for by cybercriminals. Durham town administrator Todd Selig stood by the decision, noting that the department would receive help from technology staff members and third-party contractors as opposed to sending money to cyberthieves.
"That was fine with us, because we just weren't going to play the ransom game," said Selig. "We looked at this as a criminal action, and we know going in that we had a backup of all our data."
This real-world example illustrates the critical importance of planning ahead for security events of this kind. Everyone from individual users to large agencies should have a continuity plan in place that includes a backup of all sensitive information. Without such resources in place, the Durham police department could have lost a considerable amount of mission-critical data. Because they were prepared, Selig said the infection became more of an inconvenience rather than a disaster, and simply impeded officers from working for a short time, according to TechWorld.
Selig noted that the event taught police just how essential their security is.
"No one did badly here - we're dealing with technology that's quite sneaky - but we will be giving a lot of thought as to what things we might want to enhance within our security systems," Selig said according to NBC News. "This got past our strong antivirus technology, and we want to be stronger the second time."
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