Suspected ransomware attack hits Scottish council

Public services across the Na h-Eileanan Siar - the Outer Hebrides - in Scotland continue to be disrupted following a suspected ransomware attack on the IT systems of the local council, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar. "Writing on X, the website formerly known as Twitter, a spokesperson for Comhairle nan Eilean Siar said:"Access to Comhairle nan Eilean Siar's IT system has been affected by an incident which has caused significant disruption. "Comhairle nan Eilean Siar is engaging with Police Scotland, Scottish Government and the National Cyber Security Centre [NCSC] following a criminal cyber incident on 7 November." "The Comhairle's priority following this incident is to restore and secure services ensuring their continued delivery to those in our communities who need them most." Council chief executive Malcolm Burr told the BBC the organisation had been the victim of a "Criminal attack on our IT system". He noted that the council's systems come under attack from around the world on a near-daily basis. "You would be surprised by the number of attempts that our firewall repulses," he said. "Fergal Lyons, cyber security evangelist at Centripetal, commented:"Mr Burr commented specifically about the number of attempts that his firewall repulses each day - I think he would be equally surprised by how many attempts get through his firewall. Even the most powerful firewalls are limited in their ability to stay up to date with new threat sources and block them effectively. "Mr Burr commented specifically about the number of attempts that his firewall repulses each day - I think he would be equally surprised by how many attempts get through his firewall". "To be effective at mitigating threats, we need to understand where the attacks are coming from, by using all available threat intelligence to fend off attacks before they penetrate clearly vulnerable networks," said Lyons. He added: "The scourge of ransomware continues to grow both in scale and in impact across the industry. The most common vectors for attacks [are] via email and fake websites where employees unknowingly - and perhaps carelessly - open the door allowing hackers to enter. User education is critical, but so is effective blocking of known bad domains and IP addresses at a network level." At the time of writing, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar's website remains inaccessible from a public internet connection, but the council stated it has restored access to its email services and is working to redirect phone numbers for core public-facing services. The council has provided a list of temporary contact details for residents to access social care services, which can be found here. Comprising over 75 islands, more than 50 of which are uninhabited, Na h-Eileanan Siar is home to approximately 27,000 people - over 50% of them Gaelic speakers as of 2001 - the largest town being Stornoway on Lewis and Harris. The archipelago stretches over 100 miles from north to south, and has been inhabited since prehistoric times, with the first known written reference to its existence coming courtesy of ancient Roman writer and naturalist Pliny the Elder. Along with the Orkney and Shetland islands and the Isle of Man, Na h-Eileanan Siar came under Norse control for many centuries, before being ceded to the Kingdom of Scotland in the 13th century. More recently, they were subjected to great cruelty by the British government during the Highland Clearances, which saw many people leave the islands for North America, in particular Canada. Today, the islands' economy centres on tourism, fishing and farming, and there are still over 900 active crofters. With an ageing population and many young people leaving the remote islands in search of more opportunities, the council's services have come to be of vital importance.

This Cyber News was published on www.computerweekly.com. Publication date: Thu, 30 Nov 2023 23:19:27 +0000


Cyber News related to Suspected ransomware attack hits Scottish council

British Government Minister Told Council to Keep Quiet After Ransomware Attack - An unnamed British government minister told the leader of Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council to keep quiet about the impact of a catastrophic ransomware attack two years ago, a parliamentary committee was told on Monday. The pressure from central ...
1 year ago Therecord.media
English council spent £1.1 million recovering from ransomware attack - Gloucester City Council in the West Midlands of England was forced to spend more than £1.1 million to recover from a ransomware attack in December 2021, according to the published agenda of a council meeting that took place on Monday. The meeting ...
1 year ago Therecord.media
Suspected ransomware attack hits Scottish council - Public services across the Na h-Eileanan Siar - the Outer Hebrides - in Scotland continue to be disrupted following a suspected ransomware attack on the IT systems of the local council, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar. "Writing on X, the website formerly ...
1 year ago Computerweekly.com
Hive Ransomware: A Detailed Analysis - This past week, on January 26th, to be exact, the FBI successfully shut down the Hive ransomware group and saved victims over a hundred million dollars in ransom payments and remediation costs. As ransomware continues to be a national security threat ...
1 year ago Heimdalsecurity.com
The Top 10 Ransomware Groups of 2023 - This article takes an in-depth look at the rise in ransomware attacks over the past year and the criminal groups driving the surge in cyber extortion. LockBit has established itself as one of the most notorious ransomware operations since emerging on ...
10 months ago Securityboulevard.com
Ransomware Roundup - The Ransomware Roundup report aims to provide readers with brief insights into the evolving ransomware landscape and the Fortinet solutions that protect against those variants. This edition of the Ransomware Roundup covers the 8base ransomware. 8base ...
11 months ago Feeds.fortinet.com
Medusa Ransomware Turning Your Files into Stone - Unit 42 Threat Intelligence analysts have noticed an escalation in Medusa ransomware activities and a shift in tactics toward extortion, characterized by the introduction in early 2023 of their dedicated leak site called the Medusa Blog. The Unit 42 ...
10 months ago Unit42.paloaltonetworks.com
The Week in Ransomware - An international law enforcement operation claims to have dismantled a ransomware affiliate operation in Ukraine, which was responsible for attacks on organizations in 71 countries. The threat actors are said to be affiliates of numerous ransomware ...
1 year ago Bleepingcomputer.com
Ransomware's Impact May Include Heart Attacks, Strokes & PTSD - First-order harms: Direct targets of ransomware attacks. The increasing convergence of IT and OT leave physical infrastructures more vulnerable to ransomware, even though most ransomware operators lack the capability to directly compromise OT or ...
10 months ago Techrepublic.com
Dozens of countries will pledge to stop paying ransomware gangs - An alliance of 40 countries will sign a pledge during the third annual International Counter-Ransomware Initiative summit in Washington, D.C., to stop paying ransoms demanded by cybercriminal groups. Addressing reporters on Monday, Anne Neuberger, ...
1 year ago Bleepingcomputer.com
The Week in Ransomware - Governments struck back this week against members of ransomware operations, imposing sanctions on one threat actor and sentencing another to prison. On Tuesday, the Australian, US, and UK governments announced sanctions against Aleksandr Gennadievich ...
10 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
Ransomware trends and recovery strategies companies should know - Ransomware attacks can have severe consequences, causing financial losses, reputational damage, and operational disruptions. The methods used to deliver ransomware vary, including phishing emails, malicious websites, and exploiting vulnerabilities in ...
11 months ago Helpnetsecurity.com
Waiting for the BlackCat rebrand - We saw another ransomware operation shut down this week after first getting breached by law enforcement and then targeting critical infrastructure, putting them further in the spotlight of the US government. While the Tor onion domain seizure was a ...
8 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
The Week in Ransomware - Earlier this month, the BlackCat/ALPHV ransomware operation suffered a five-day disruption to their Tor data leak and negotiation sites, rumored to be caused by a law enforcement action. The FBI revealed this week that they hacked the BlackCat/ALPHV ...
11 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
Ransomware Roundup - On a bi-weekly basis, FortiGuard Labs gathers data on ransomware variants of interest that have been gaining traction within our datasets and the OSINT community. The Ransomware Roundup report aims to provide readers with brief insights into the ...
8 months ago Feeds.fortinet.com
Top 10 Notorious Ransomware Gangs of 2023 - By employing a multitude of advanced techniques like double extortion along with other illicit tactics, ransomware groups are continually evolving at a rapid pace. Here below, we have mentioned all the types of ransomware used by the threat actors ...
11 months ago Cybersecuritynews.com
Targeting homeowners' data - As these companies obtain a large amount of sensitive information from their customers, they become attractive targets for ransomware gangs to conduct double-extortion attacks. Finland is also warning of Akira ransomware increasingly targeting ...
10 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
Ransomware in 2023 recap: 5 key takeaways - This provides the best overall picture of ransomware activity, but the true number of attacks is far higher. While some ransomware trends hardly changed over the last year, such as LockBit's continued dominance, ransomware criminals also challenged ...
9 months ago Malwarebytes.com
Declining Ransomware Payments: Shift in Hacker Tactics? - Several cybersecurity advisories and agencies recommend not caving into ransomware gangs' demands and paying their ransoms. It seems the tide is turning, with a decline in ransomware payments; this article explores the trend and what it might mean ...
9 months ago Securityboulevard.com
Ransomware Roundup - On a bi-weekly basis, FortiGuard Labs gathers data on ransomware variants of interest that have been gaining traction within our datasets and the OSINT community. The Ransomware Roundup report aims to provide readers with brief insights into the ...
10 months ago Feeds.fortinet.com
The Week in Ransomware - Attacks on hospitals continued this week, with ransomware operations disrupting patient care as they force organization to respond to cyberattacks. While many, like LockBit, claim to have policies in place to avoid encryping hospitals, we continue to ...
10 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
The Week in Ransomware - Today's column brings you two weeks of information on the latest ransomware attacks and research after we skipped last week's article. BleepingComputer has learned that some of the BlackCat/ALPHV affiliates are not buying the explanation and have ...
11 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
Key Group uses leaked builders of ransomware and wipers | Securelist - The first discovered sample of Key Group, the Xorist ransomware, established persistence in the system by changing file extension associations. The .huis_bn extension added to encrypted files in the early versions of Key Group samples, Xorist and ...
2 months ago Securelist.com
The Week in Ransomware - This week was pretty quiet on the ransomware front, with most of the attention on the seizure of the BreachForums data theft forum. That does not mean there was nothing of interest released this week about ransomware. A report by CISA said that the ...
6 months ago Bleepingcomputer.com
VX-Underground malware collective framed by Phobos ransomware - A new Phobos ransomware variant frames the popular VX-Underground malware-sharing collective, indicating the group is behind attacks using the encryptor. Phobos launched in 2018 in what is believed to be a ransomware-as-a-service derived from the ...
1 year ago Bleepingcomputer.com

Latest Cyber News


Cyber Trends (last 7 days)


Trending Cyber News (last 7 days)