Israel’s Shirbit Insurance Company is the latest victim of a ransomware attack. Shirbit’s systems were breached by a group known as Black Shadow. Israel’s Capital Market Authority and the Israel National Cyber Directorate revealed the breach.
Check Point Software has uncovered many such ransomware threats recently. The biggest discovery made by Check Point Research was that the Pay2Key ransomware came from Iran.
Ransomware works by taking control of a victim’s computer or even the entire systems of a private organization through a type of computer virus. The attackers then extort a fee in exchange for returning control of the computers affected to their owners.
It also can be a hack whereby sensitive information is stolen and then the hackers extort a ransom in exchange for not releasing the stolen data publicly. This is worse because in the first kind of attack the victim knows that he has regained control of his systems but in the second he can never know what the end will be and the villains can demand payments in perpetuity.
This is what happened to Shirbit. Private information of countless clients was stolen.
A tweet from Black Shadow was forwarded by another Twitter user. It reads: “We want to give a chance to Shirbit Company. You have 24 hours to send 50 BTC to our wallet and we will not disclose your data and also will not sell to anybody”
“If you will not pay after 24 hours the price will change to 100 BTC. In thirds day you have to pay 200 BTC ($4 million). After that we will end data to others.”
The hackers also threatened to release a part of the stolen data every 24 hours until the ransom is paid.
Source : Jewish Business News
