Whats the hazard that could happen when a Ransomware malware hits University?
Previously, that's about last month ago, the IT department of the University of Calgary in Alberta called a technology based website CEO and Founder to help them get rid of a Ransomware
infection that locked down all its student's results just a day before
the results would officially be announced.
Unfortunately, there was no decrypter available for that specific
ransomware sample, but luckily for them that they had the digital backup for the
examination results in the form of hundreds of excel sheets.
So, somehow backup helped administrator to re-compile complete result
once again into the database, but this delayed the announcement for over
30 days.
However, the situation is not same every time.
Recently, the
University of Calgary in Alberta paid a ransom of
$20,000 to decrypt their computer systems' files and regain access to
its own email system after getting hit by a ransomware infection.
The University fell victim to ransomware last month, when the malware
installed itself on computers, encrypted all documents and demanded
$20,000 in Bitcoins to recover the data.
Also Read: Ethical Methods On How To Bypass Any Locked Android Screen
Since the University obviously was not properly backing up the data, the
administrators have agreed to pay up the ransom amount, the university announced in a release Tuesday, after a cyber attack that left students and staff unable to access university-issued PCs, email or Skype.
"As part of efforts to maintain all options to address these systems
issues, the university has paid a ransom totaling about $20,000 CDN that
was demanded as part of this 'ransomware' attack," Linda Dalgetty, VP of finance and services at the University said in a release.
The University assured its staff and students that no personal or
University data was released to the public and that it is working with
Calgary police to investigate the cyber attack that affected more than
100 computers.
The university's IT department is still on the process of assessing and
evaluating the decryption keys and is working to recover data and ensure
all of the corrupted systems are operational again.
The University also confirmed the decryption keys provided by the
attacker worked successfully. The email service for its students and
staff was brought back yesterday, but not on the original University
system.
The University did not further comment on how the infection made its way into their systems and networks.
Also Read: Russia To Launch New Linux Based Mobile To Kill Android And iOS.
They saw
an enormous rise in Ransomware threats, both in numbers and
sophistication. You would be surprised to know about the latest version
of Cerber ransomware that generates a different sample in every 15
seconds in order to bypass signature-based antivirus software.
One of the best first steps in securing your environment is to deploy automated and isolated backup mechanism, along with an at the network level as well as host-based IDS on your critical assets.
IDS gives you detailed insight into what exactly is coming across the
wire, instead of just relying on signature-based antivirus and
anti-malware software.
You can try (USM) that includes an inbuilt IDS with SIEM and real-time
threat intelligence to help you quickly detect malware and other threats
in your network.
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Title : University Pays Hacker $20,000 To Get Back Its Infected Files
Description : Whats the hazard that could happen when a Ransomware malware hits University? Previously, that's about last month ago, the IT depart...
