Pendragon Group, that is into commercial car sales, was reportedly hit by a ransomware attack recently and Lockbit group is suspected to be behind the incident. The car dealer having over 200 dealerships has straight away denied paying a ransom of $60 million dollars and cleared the air that it is going to revive the encrypted data through a data continuity plan.
Kim Costello, the Chief Marketing Officer(CMO) has acknowledged the incident and confirmed that Lockbit criminal gang was behind the encryption of its servers.
UK’s NCSC received a report on the cyber attack and has passed on to other law enforcement agencies for investigation.
Unconfirmed sources said that the cyber criminal group could have stolen about 8% of data from the database and might have gained hands on more, if the IT staff of the car seller did not react on time and contained the malware spread through steps.
Interestingly, the digital attack took place when Sweden-based company Hedin Mobility Group was about to acquire Pendragon for £400 million.
NOTE- Paying a ransom to hackers doesn’t guaranty the return of the decryption key in exchange and there is a high probability that the criminal gang can hack twice or thrice the same target in a financial year. The FBI conveyed the same in November 2019; however, the law enforcement bureau has also asked victims to act according to the situation and decide whether to pay.
