Industrial Spy, a hacking group involved in ransomware attacks, targeted at Novartis last week, stealing sensitive information from the manufacturing division of the company servers. However, the healthcare firm based in Switzerland issued a public statement on an immediate note, striking off the speculations that critical company data was compromised.

Hacking group Industrial Spy has a habit of targeting large organizations and sells their data in the marketplace. It first infiltrates the victim network, steals data and then locks it out with encryption until a ransom is paid.

Novartis stated it has always taken security and privacy seriously and will further take all necessary measures to eradicate such threats on its company network in the future.

According to reliable sources, an Israeli College was hit by a ransomware group that stole personal information from staff and students. The incident took place on Thursday last week. But came to the discovery of the staff when some senior graduates of Sapir College received text messages that their digital accounts were hacked.

Israeli News resource, Arutz Sheva, stated that a hacking group named Moses Staff that is now involved in ransomware distribution could have involved in locking down the network of Sapir College.

Previously, Moses Staff had hacked into the network of Israel Electric Corporation and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems. And is suspected to have hacked over 172 Israel government servers and over 219 websites siphoning over 34 terabytes of data.

Third is a news related to a ransomware bill that was passed by US House of Representatives recently. According to the sources reporting to our Cybersecurity Insiders, the Reporting Attacks from Nations Selected for Oversight and Monitoring Web Attacks and Ransomware from Enemies act will empower the government of united states to act swift against file encrypting malware attacks launched by foreign adversary nations.

It will also give authorization to the fed to make amendments to the 2006 US Safe Web Act and will make it mandatory for public and private entities lodge cross border complaints against individuals and groups launching ransomware and other digital attacks.

So, will America have more power to sue Russia, China, North Korea and Iran for launching cyber attacks on its critical infrastructure of the USA?

Well, not likely, as all that we can do is press sanctions on such nations. And it is not making any difference in slowing down their activities or intentions.

 

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The first news headline that is trending on Google belongs to Costa Rica Government websites. Information is out that Costa Rica’s Public Health System was recently targeted by Hive Ransomware and the incident happened just after a few days of attack by Conti Ransomware Group.

Going deep into the details, Costa Rican Social Security Fund (CCSS)’s website has been pulled down as the database has been targeted by Hive Ransomware Group. It is being reported that Hive encrypted around 30 servers out of 1,500 government servers and the estimated recovery time is unknown.

It’s reported that the disruption tactics have reportedly hit the vaccination and Covid-19 tests deeply.

Previously, Conti demanded $23 million for freeing up the data from encryption, and this time Hive is demanding $11 million for not publicizing the stolen data it siphoned before encryption.

Second is the news that belongs to Switzerland-based Pharma company Novartis. A very less known hacking group named Industrial Spy is claiming to have siphoned some critical data from the company’s R&D servers and is now demanding $500,000 in Bitcoins to return it to the owners. Otherwise, they also issued a warning that they will sell that data on the dark web to interested parties.

However, Novartis claims that the data lying with Industrial Spy is not sensitive and has reassured that it will take all adequate steps not to allow such incidents soon.

The third is the news that belongs to Microsoft. The software giant claims that it has blocked cyber attacks on Israeli firms that could have possibly been generated by a hacking group named ‘Polonium’ linked to Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security.

Reports are in that Polonium was using around 20 OneDrive accounts to virtual abuse Israeli Companies and as soon as it received complaints, it found out the truth that Polonium had links to Tehran and was acting according to its inputs.

Interestingly, those working for Polonium are Lebanese and are seen constantly targeting businesses from Israel and acting according to Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).

 

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