{"id":2314,"date":"2021-08-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-08-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/uncategorized\/in-search-of-the-crypto-criminals\/"},"modified":"2025-02-28T14:40:38","modified_gmt":"2025-02-28T14:40:38","slug":"in-search-of-the-crypto-criminals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/in-search-of-the-crypto-criminals\/","title":{"rendered":"In search of the crypto-criminals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Secretive gangs are hacking the computers of governments, firms, even hospitals, and demanding huge sums. But if we pay these ransoms, are we  creating a ticking time bomb?<\/p>\n<p>They have the sort of names that only teenage boys or aspiring Bond villains would dream up (REvil, Grief, Wizard Spider, Ragnar), they base themselves in countries that do not cooperate with international law enforcement and they don&rsquo;t care whether they attack a hospital or a multinational corporation. Ransomware gangs are suddenly everywhere, seemingly unstoppable &ndash; and very successful.<\/p>\n<p>In June, meat producer JBS, which supplies over a fifth of all the beef in the US, paid a &pound;7.8m ransom to regain access to its computer systems. The same month, the US&rsquo;s largest national fuel pipeline, Colonial Pipeline, paid &pound;3.1m to ransomware hackers after they locked the company&rsquo;s systems, causing days of fuel shortages and paralysing the east coast. &ldquo;It was the hardest decision I&rsquo;ve made in my 39 years in the energy industry,&rdquo; said a deflated-looking Colonial CEO Joseph Blount in an evidence session before Congress. In July, hackers attacked software firm Kaseya, demanding &pound;50m. As a result, hundreds of supermarkets had to close in Sweden, because their cash registers didn&rsquo;t work.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/technology\/2021\/aug\/01\/crypto-criminals-hack-the-computer-systems-of-governments-firms-even-hospitals\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Secretive gangs are hacking the computers of governments, firms, even hospitals, and demanding huge sums. But if we pay these ransoms, are we creating a ticking time bomb? They have the sort of names that only teenage boys or aspiring Bond villains would dream up (REvil, Grief, Wizard Spider, Ragnar), they base themselves in countries [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>In search of the crypto-criminals - Regional technology news - North - TechSparx - Business technology stories in the North<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/in-search-of-the-crypto-criminals\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"In search of the crypto-criminals - Regional technology news - North - TechSparx - Business technology stories in the North\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Secretive gangs are hacking the computers of governments, firms, even hospitals, and demanding huge sums. 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