The White House is working on a response to a massive ransomware attack

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A massive ransomware attack that affected thousands of victims continued to cause chaos Sunday as the White House pledged “full resources” to investigate the hack.

Companies around the world appear to have been affected by the hacked software, being asked to pay a reported $45,000 to $5 million ransom with a focus on the full scope of Friday’s attack.

The ransomware infected Florida-based Kaseya and spread across a large number of companies, many of which use their software to serve multiple clients.

“The level of sophistication here has been extraordinary,” Kaseya CEO Fred Fukulla told The Associated Press.

About half of the company’s 37,000 customers fell victim – but 70 percent of them were “managed service providers” who used Kaseya’s software for many others. The Associated Press said it estimated that thousands were injured in total.

Although experts believe the attack originated from a group with ties to Russia, President Biden said Saturday that it was not yet clear if that was the case. He told reporters he was ordered to “deep dive” by the intelligence into the breach.

“If that is the case, either with Russia’s flag and/or as a result of it, I have told Putin that we will respond,” Biden said, according to a transcript of his comments.

Cybercrime was a topic – and a major point of contention – between Biden and Russian leader Vladimir Putin when the two world leaders met in Europe during the G7 summit.

The Associated Press, citing experts, said the Russia-linked group Revell was suspected of being behind the attack, and may have struck over the Independence Day weekend because it knows companies will have limited staff due to the holiday.

The Associated Press reported that some companies may still not know they are victims until they return to work Monday.

The White House said Sunday that the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are working with Kaseya to establish outreach to victims.

Cybersecurity teams worked frantically on Sunday, July 4, 2021, to stem the impact of the largest global ransomware attack ever recorded.

“Since Friday, the US government has been working across agencies to assess the Kaseya ransomware incident and assist in the response,” said Anne Neuberger, Deputy National Security Adviser for Internet and Emerging Technology.

“We thank the cybersecurity professionals across the FBI, CISA, and the intelligence community for working around the clock to respond to this incident.”

The White House has urged companies to report if they believe they have been hacked at the CISA Crime Complaint Center.

In ransomware attacks, victims are required to pay a ransom to gain access to scrambled data and their locked networks. Many of the businesses affected in this case were small businesses, the Associated Press said, noting that a Swedish grocery chain closed its stores for the second day in a row due to problems caused by the attack.

Cassie said she has launched a detection tool for nearly 900 customers and is working to repair and restore the service, noting that she believes she has identified how the attack occurred.

with wire

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