The Tale of Two Florida Cities
Dual Cities Pay Massive Ransom to Cybercriminals
Hackers are willing and ready to attack anyone with a vulnerable defense. There’s no such thing as a company or person who is “too small” for these kinds of attacks, and two Florida communities just learned this hard — and expensive — lesson. In June 2019, Riviera Beach, Florida, a small town of about 35,000 people, was ordered to pay a ransom of $600,000 to free their computers. On June 10, the IT systems around the city, including landline phones and emails, were under the control of hackers until payment was made. As time passed, this spread to other IT systems, locking down the city’s website, email server, and billing system, and it even affected 911 dispatch operations. The city of Riviera Beach voted unanimously to let its insurer pay 65 bitcoins, about $592,000, to the hackers behind the attack. Less than two weeks later, a second Florida community, Lake City, was hit with ransomware. City workers couldn’t access their email accounts, and members of the community could not pay
bills online. This cost Lake City 42 bitcoins, or about $500,000. Luckily, insurance will cover most of the ransom, but $10,000 will come from taxpayers. The problem with paying this ransom to hackers is that it will keep them funded and motivated to strike again. There is also a chance these cities will not get their data back at all, which is why law enforcement usually does not support paying ransoms. However, these Florida cities still paid the ransoms, and it poses many questions. The most pressing of these is, “Will cybercriminals attack other local or state governments?” Don’t let attackers and ransomware scam your company out of thousands of dollars. Let Network Access and our NetWatchman Services help you get the protection you and your customers need. Learn more by visiting NetworkAccess.com or calling 412-931-1111.
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