ransomware
Treasury

The Treasury Department is asking organizations not to pay off malicious actors to terminate ransomware attacks without carefully considering possible national security threats – and said it may implement penalties for organizations that choose to pay ransom to their attackers. […]

Cyber workforce

Rep. John Katko, R-N.Y., introduced the State and Local Government Cybersecurity Improvement Act on Aug. 30 to help state and local governments combat cyberattacks. The legislation comes in the wake of increasing ransomware attacks targeting state and local governments, including Katko’s own state.   […]

ransomware
ransomware

Jackson County, Ga., paid cybercriminals $400,000 to remove ransomware that infected its IT systems. The ransomware, known as Ryuk Ransomware, hit the county on March 1 and impacted multiple county agencies, including the Sheriff’s Office. […]

Cybersecurity cyber

Cybersecurity technologies provider Symantec reported that ransomware activity fell by 20 percent in 2018 on a year-over-year basis, but that the focus of attacks shifted sharply toward enterprises and away from consumers last year. […]

ransomware

North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein released a report on Thursday that highlights the impact of data breaches on the state in 2018, and paired the report with a bipartisan bill to strengthen breach notifications to include ransomware attacks. […]

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) last week released its Health Industry Cybersecurity Practices, a set of voluntary cybersecurity guidelines for the private sector that leverages the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework to address cybersecurity issues across healthcare organizations of all sizes. […]

ransomware

The incidence of ransomware attacks in the U.S. has leveled off since 2017 for a variety of reasons, including improved defenses by targeted organizations that have made such attacks less profitable for perpetrators, experts said Tuesday at the 2018 Symantec  Government Symposium. […]

SBA

Industry experts told Congress on Oct. 3 that regulations are necessary to secure the Internet of Things. “Is the industry doing enough to ensure the security of IoT devices?” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., asked at the IT Subcommittee hearing on the Cybersecurity of IoT. […]

The cyberattack that spread across Europe on June 27 was declared not a ransomware attack after further observation by researchers. The “Not Petya” attack didn’t encrypt files on the infected computers. Instead, it wiped the entire drive, making it impossible to retrieve files if they weren’t backed up on another device. […]

Companies that paid the ransom to retrieve their data from the Petya ransomware attack have no way of receiving the encryption key. Although Symantec has verified the Ukrainian accounting service, MeDoc, as “patient zero” for the attack, the cybersecurity company hasn’t discovered who is behind the attack. The email account that the attack stemmed from has been shut down, so that companies that pay the ransom of $300 won’t receive the encryption key needed to return their data. […]

Another cyberattack with links to the stolen cache of National Security Agency materials is spreading across Europe on June 27, targeting banks, businesses, and a Ukraine power company. Infections have been reported in Russia, Ukraine, Spain, France, the United Kingdom, and India. […]

The number of reported Internet crimes and the costs incurred by those crimes are on the rise, according to the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center’s recently released 2016 Internet Threat Report. The “hottest” Internet crimes of 2016 were business email compromise, ransomware, tech support fraud, and extortion. […]

No Federal systems have been affected by the WannaCry ransomware attacks that crippled thousands of computers this past weekend, according to Tom Bossert, Homeland Security adviser to the president. […]

Though the Federal government has certainly experienced ransomware attacks, experts speaking at the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association Cybersecurity Summit on Tuesday explained that it is not the primary target for ransomware hackers. […]

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights recently released new Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act guidance on ransomware. […]

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