British Library hailed by UK cyber agency for its response to ransomware attack

The British Library - the national library of the United Kingdom and an archive of millions of books and manuscripts - was hit by an initially unspecified attack last October, although internally the cause was known to be ransomware.
The nature of the attack became public when the Rhysida gang subsequently claimed credit and attempted to sell the library's stolen personnel data.
Although there are secure copies of all of the items in this catalog, the attack left the majority of the library's digital infrastructure unusable.
Recovery is still ongoing five months later, with the infrastructure rebuild expected to be complete by mid-April, at which point the library will begin restoring its systems in a phased manner.
The library detailed its recovery process in an 18-page incident review earlier this month.
The move to publish the review - in stark contrast to the secrecy which most organizations respond to ransomware attacks with - was widely acclaimed.
It is not clear whether the NCSC believes that confirming the nature of a ransomware attack might aid the attackers.
A spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Leicester City Council, another publicly funded organization in Britain, has this month also confirmed being hit by an unspecified cyberattack.
The leader of Redcar and Cleveland Council told a parliamentary inquiry last year that she had been pressured to keep quiet about an attack that disrupted services there in 2020.
Disruptive cyberattacks affecting local authorities have surged according to security incident trends data released by the Information Commissioner's Office, with 67 ransomware attacks recorded in the first three quarters of 2023 compared to 13 during the whole of 2022.
New Zealand media company: Hackers directly targeting individuals after alleged data breach.
He was previously a technology reporter for Sky News and is also a fellow at the European Cyber Conflict Research Initiative.

This Cyber News was published on therecord.media. Publication date: Mon, 18 Mar 2024 13:00:13 +0000