Cyber-crooks Compromise FOX21 News’ E-mail Server
Cyber-criminals, around 4th-5th of May 2013, hacked into FOX21 News' e-mail server, reports Help Net Security dated May 7, 2013.
It maybe noted that FOX21 runs under 20th Century Fox as a production arm for reality TV shows, is a film studio among the 6 prominent ones of USA, as well as runs as a News Corporation subsidiary of Rupert Mudroch.
Thorough information about the incidence isn't available, however, as per one FOX21 News report, it's apparent that the electronic mail server of the company was infected with a ransomware.
Usually, ransomware is made to plainly freeze a PC's screen till as long as the affected user pays a ransom, but, within the current case, the malicious program apparently encoded the files that were on the server, subsequently directing the organization that it must make a payment of $5,000 (EUR3,800) for retrieving those encrypted documents.
Rachel Welte, reporter at FOX21 stated that the company's engineers conducted certain study and discovered that the hacker attacked several servers globally, yet the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation couldn't hunt him down owing to a ghost address he was utilizing. Help Net Security published this.
Normally, ransomware-encrypted files are impossible to retrieve due to the use of extremely effective encryption algorithms, but if the situation is most fortunate then it mayn't be too severe a problem for cracking an encryption.
FOX21 engineers managed making its e-mail system run like usual on early May 6, 2013 a Monday.
A TV station namely KVDR, affiliated to FOX, and situated at Denver, Colorado conjectures that probably the "Operation USA" of Anonymous targeted the electronic mail server of this station, amongst others.
Disturbing events similar to the above emphasize how ransom software has actually projected as an enormous problem for Internet users since years because of huge profits cyber-thieves yield from it. Indeed, at around 2012-end, whilst security companies did a compilation task of their usual dismantling of the greatest cyber-attacks forecasted for 2013, they found ransomware as a highly threatening one for keeping vigilance of. Today, that forecast has proved right with the above incident happening, the specialists conclude.
» SPAMfighter News - 5/14/2013
