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Ransomware Attack South Africa

Fight Back Against the Rise of Ransomware in SA with EDR Solutions

When cyberattacks are on the rise, as they certainly have been in South Africa this year, an organisation cannot afford to have its cybersecurity operating in a reactive manner. And yet, far too many businesses operate in this manner, making them prime targets for a breach. This is according to Milad Aslaner, Senior Director, Cyber Defense Strategy at SentinelOne, which helps organisations to prevent, detect, respond to and remediate end-point threats using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. Its endpoint security products are distributed throughout Africa by Networks Unlimited. Aslaner explains: “Endpoints including laptop computers, tablets, and phones provide entry points to a wider network penetration that could harm the organisation, and which is one of the goals of ran...

When Ransomware Strikes, Can You Recover Fast Enough?

Sourced from Kaspersky Ransomware attacks have become increasingly common, and they are even available on the dark Web to purchase as a service. There have been many incidents in the news, where major companies have been left with little choice other than to pay the ransom to get their data back, often amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars. The reality is that ransomware and other cyberattacks have become a question of when not if. The ability to respond and recover quickly has therefore become an essential part of successful ransomware defence, but it is something many organisations, especially in South Africa, struggle with. Consider Some Statistics The State of Ransomware report from security firm Sophos reveals that, over the last year, the average cost of remediating a ransomw...

Transnet Undergoes Apparent Ransomware Hack

Image sourced from News24. South Africa’s logistics and port operator Transnet has been the victim of an apparent ransomware attack, with its IT systems, websites and Navis container terminal OS going offline yesterday morning. The hack was first identified when several stakeholders in the freight industry were not able to access the container terminals at the Durban port in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). “There was a memo issued to staff on Thursday morning that their terminal computers had been hacked and it came from the Transnet IT system. They said that they were working on it, but by Thursday afternoon the system was still offline,” said one stakeholder, quoted by The Sowetan. “Some operations, including rail, has gone manual but the end result is that no import containers are able to be proce...

5000 Attack Attempts in 22 Countries Due to REvil Ransomware Campaign

Image sourced from Forbes. On 2 July 2021, it became known that the REvil ransomware gang perpetrated a large attack against Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and their clients around the world. The far-reaching attack affected firms across 22 countries, including South Africa, the UK, Canada, Argentina, Mexico and Spain, amongst others. This led to thousands of companies becoming potential victims of ransomware. At the moment of writing, Kaspersky reports that their researchers have already observed over 5000 infection attempts in Europe, North and South America. REvil Ransomware Group REvil (aka Sodinokibi) is one of the most prolific ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) operators that first surfaced in 2019, and made numerous headlines in the past few months due to the targets they hit and the...