Hackers are taking cities hostage. Here’s a way around it.

[Gerald]

HACKERS ARE taking cities hostage, and some cities are paying ransom to the criminals. That needs to change.

Ransomware attacks on municipalities are https://www.recordedfuture.com/state...mware-attacks/. Last year, it was Atlanta, which spent $2.6 million to recover rather than pay the demanded $51,000. Before that, it was suburbs of Dallas and of Birmingham, Ala., and localities in North Carolina and New Mexico. Last month, hackers crippled Baltimore, which is still working to restore its systems without paying the $100,000 or so the hackers demand. And then there are places that decide to pay, such as the Florida town that decided to fork over a whopping $600,000 to the bad guys last week, desperate to de-paralyze its computer systems and restore essential services to its residents.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...f6a_story.html


This will become commonplace in the future, I think, when society is vulnerable, some reports have come to the public but probably the authorities darken this because it does not create imbalance in everyday life.

[Skybird]

I have read severla rpeorts this year about cities, hosoitals and energy suppliers beign blackmailed by comoputer n etwork hijacks, mostly in the Us it seems, but also in Europe, but over here, so i got the impression, it is not so much a city'S admimnstraiton but single institutions like hospitals and cpompanies beign blackmailed.



How nice it will all become when cash money is gone and all finances are purely digital only, and nobody can escape the digital regime. You cannot help it, you must love it.



Banks' computer IT usually is amongst the oldest out there, btw - and the most vulnerable. Nobody with a sane mind would accept to have "bank standard security" as his security standard in anything in his life. Its too bad.

[Skybird]

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-48770128


My compassion is extremely limited.

[Gerald]

^$500,000 is a lot.Time to Fl. looks over the protection.