Russian hackers developed RYUK Ransomware is said to have hit the servers operating in the city of Port Lavaca disrupting almost all the critical servers of the City Hall. However, Mayor Jack Whitlow has assured that no data was compromised in the incident and the activity to re-build the data from backups was already going on full swing.
News is out that the City Hall of Port Lavaca has already incurred a $50,000 bill due to the incident, which might be covered by the insurance cover.
The billing systems and auto-pay systems of the city hall were reportedly badly disrupted in the incident and a malware clean up is due to be done by the end of this week.
No servers related to water, sewer, police department, and other essential services were affected by the Ryuk ransomware in the incident. As there is a need to buy new hardware and software to rebuild the systems, access to data can be expected to be restored by early next month.
Highly placed sources report that the Ryuk virus might have entered the network through the email system and hackers might have spread the malware through a phishing email.
The Mayor has made it official that the decision to pay up the ransom will only be handled by the FBI. Also, Whitlow partially did accept the fact that the hackers were demanding $200,000 as a ransom to free up the data.
Note- In the case of RYUK ransomware spread, the hackers first steal a portion of the data from the server and then lock up the files from access until a ransom is paid. If the victim denies paying the ransom or fails to pay the pre-determined amount, those spreading RYUK ransomware will raise funds by selling the stolen data on the web.
