Metrolinx, an Ontario, Canada based public transit agency has released a press release stating that it became a recent victim of a North Korean cyberattack. Officials from the transit agency say that the attack was launched by North Korea hackers via a Russian IP address.
Note- Since, last November, Russia is reported to be offering Internet connectivity to the whole of North Korea.
Metrolinx spokesperson Anne Marie Aikins has confirmed to CBC Toronto that the agency was still under the influence of a cyber attack. But Aikins assured that no data was compromised during this incident.
And according to a source from CTV news which leaked the news first to the world, the attack took place last week when hackers tried to penetrate into the firewalls of the organizations. Though they succeeded in compromising one of the many servers, none of the employee or customer data was compromised in this incident.
Scribes of Cybersecurity Insiders have learned that Metrolinx already has a team of ethical hackers in its IT team whose job is to detect and track down cyber threats. It said that last Friday, the team tracked down the attack to a source from North Korea, and has evidence that the attack was routed through Russia.
Note- Our readers have to notify that Metrolinx is a transit agency which is responsible for the implementation and management of the Presto Card- a fare card system that can be used in all public transport systems in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, as well as some in places in Ottawa. Currently, the organization has more than 3.2 million customers holding Presto cards and over 2.1 million of them have been registered. Since all registered users provide the agency with some personal and financial info, the data share can easily invite trouble when leaked.
