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posted by martyb on Monday June 29 2020, @11:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the backups-are-your-friend dept.

How hackers extorted $1.14m from a US university:

A leading medical-research institution working on a cure for Covid-19 has admitted it paid hackers a $1.14m (£910,000) ransom after a covert negotiation witnessed by BBC News.

The Netwalker criminal gang attacked University of California San Francisco (UCSF) on 1 June.

IT staff unplugged computers in a race to stop the malware spreading.

And an anonymous tip-off enabled BBC News to follow the ransom negotiations in a live chat on the dark web.

[...] At first glance, its dark-web homepage looks like a standard customer-service website, with a frequently asked questions (FAQ) tab, an offer of a "free" sample of its software and a live-chat option.

But there is also a countdown timer ticking down to a time when the hackers either double the price of their ransom, or delete the data they have scrambled with malware.

Also at Security Week.


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  • (Score: 2) by Subsentient on Tuesday June 30 2020, @11:12AM (3 children)

    by Subsentient (1111) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @11:12AM (#1014446) Homepage Journal

    I agree -- what the malware operators did here was absolutely appalling. It could reasonably be called a crime against humanity. They need to spend 30 years in prison for this.

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    "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Tuesday June 30 2020, @03:44PM (2 children)

    by Gaaark (41) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @03:44PM (#1014540) Journal

    How many years should the people who put Windows on the computers get?

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    • (Score: 2) by toddestan on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:02PM

      by toddestan (4982) on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:02PM (#1014728)

      Easy. If it's Windows 10, then 10 years. If it's Windows 7, then only 7 years.

    • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:35PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2020, @10:35PM (#1014746)

      640 years should be enough for any crime.