Law firms and other organizations with sensitive data may be willing to pay to keep news of a compromise quiet - and these organizations may be uniquely sensitive to leakware attacks.īut don't feel like you're safe if you don't fit these categories: as we noted, some ransomware spreads automatically and indiscriminately across the internet. For instance, government agencies or medical facilities often need immediate access to their files. On the other hand, some organizations are tempting targets because they seem more likely to pay a ransom quickly. Sometimes it's a matter of opportunity: for instance, attackers might target universities because they tend to have smaller security teams and a disparate user base that does a lot of file sharing, making it easier to penetrate their defenses. There are several different ways attackers choose the organizations they target with ransomware. ![]() But because finding and extracting such information is a very tricky proposition for attackers, encryption ransomware is by far the most common type. There is also a variation, called leakware or doxware, in which the attacker threatens to publicize sensitive data on the victim's hard drive unless a ransom is paid. But most attacks don't bother with this pretense. In some forms of malware, the attacker might claim to be a law enforcement agency shutting down the victim's computer due to the presence of pornography or pirated software on it, and demanding the payment of a "fine," perhaps to make victims less likely to report the attack to authorities. The user is presented with a message explaining that their files are now are now inaccessible and will only be decrypted if the victim sends an untraceable Bitcoin payment to the attacker. But the most important thing to know is that at the end of the process, the files cannot be decrypted without a mathematical key known only by the attacker. If you want the technical details, the Infosec Institute has a great in-depth look at how several flavors of ransomware encrypt files. Three years ago Kronos' US arm was sued by a nursing home employee who said its fingerprint-scanning tech violated a US state's privacy laws.There are several things the malware might do once it’s taken over the victim's computer, but by far the most common action is to encrypt some or all of the user's files. While there is a possibility that ransomware criminals could compromise those if the vuln they used exists in Kronos' software, rather than a network misconfiguration, in the short term, those on-prem deployments naturally won't be affected by the main Kronos shutdown. We understand some of Kronos' product and services can be deployed on-premises. UK umbrella payroll firm Giant Pay confirms it was hit by 'sophisticated' cyber-attack.Log4j RCE: Emergency patch issued to plug critical auth-free code execution hole in widely used logging utility.Irish Health Service ransomware attack happened after one staffer opened malware-ridden email.Ransomwared payroll provider leaks data on 38,000 Australian government workers.Neither is the attackers' identity publicly known at the time of writing. It is not yet known whether the Log4j remote code execution vulnerability was the attackers' way in. In the meantime we have contingencies in place to make sure our colleagues continue to receive their pay.” We have asked the company for comment and will update this article if it responds.Ī Sainsbury’s spokesperson said: “We’re in close contact with Kronos while they investigate a systems issue. "Issues companies will have is employees don't know their schedule (it's in Kronos) and then when they clock in and out, that clock won't go anywhere," a Register reader, who works for an affected firm, told us. Kronos' timekeeping products are used by companies in the UK including supermarket chain Sainsburys, Boots the Chemist and Jaguar Land Rover, and large outfits in the US including Clemson Uni in South Carolina, USA Winthrop University Hospital in Long Island, New York and US state and local government customers such as Santa Clara County. ![]() We took immediate action to investigate and mitigate the issue, and have determined that this is a ransomware incident affecting the Kronos Private Cloud - the portion of our business where UKG Workforce Central, UKG TeleStaff, Healthcare Extensions, and Banking Scheduling Solutions are deployed. We are reaching out to inform you of a cyber security incident that has disrupted the Kronos Private Cloud.Īs we previously communicated, late on Saturday, December 11, 2021, we became aware of unusual activity impacting UKG solutions using Kronos Private Cloud.
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