Leominster Schools’ data, email and website held hostage
During the week of April 16th Leominster Schools networks have been infiltrated by malware, rendering data and systems inaccessible to student and staff. It’s been reported that school’s email system, data and website have been adversely affected and remain crippled as of this writing.
Officials have decided to pay $10,000 ransom demands in digital currency … bitcoin. The payment was made by the city last Friday, however Mayor Dean Mazzarella stated it was uncertain when Massachusetts officials would regain control.
The school officials believe they will have access to their systems “very soon “and blame the impediment on the digital currency process. “It’s all being done through Bitcoin. It’s very convoluted,” Mayor said. This sound rather odd as processing digital payments doesn’t take over a week…
Though paying the ransom is generally a bad route, as it further encourages these illicit acts, some victims don’t seem to have another choice. This begs the questions: Did they not have adequate business continuity plans in place? Did all backups get affected by ransomware?