The hacker group Kaseya attack a US IT service provider. German companies are also affected.
New York – A cyber attack paralyzed thousands of companies on Friday. The Russian hacker group “REvil” is suspected. It is said to have played a defective update on the desktop management tool VSA from Kaseya and thus affected the customers of the US IT service provider. For example, the supermarket checkout and accounting systems were paralyzed by the attack. IT security experts found the decisive clue in the software code of the hacking group REvil.
“The first impression was that the Russian government is not behind it, but we are not sure yet,” said US President Joe Biden at a press conference on Saturday. He also ordered an investigation into the attack by the US secret services.
Cyber attack in the USA: German companies also affected
But not only companies in the USA felt the consequences of the attack. At the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI), an IT service provider from Germany stated that it had also suffered impairments. This is reported by tagesschau.de. Several thousand computers at several companies were blocked by the attack. In addition, the spokesman did not rule out that further cases would become known with the new working week starting on Monday.
The customers affected also included other European companies, such as the Swedish supermarket chain Coop. She had to close almost all of the total of 800 shops because the till systems had been paralyzed. Only five branches and the Coop online shop remained in operation. The chain announced this on its website.
REvil demands ransom from affected companies
So far there is no overview of the damage caused. Security experts suspect that around 1000 companies are affected. According to “REvil” itself, more than a million computers were infected.
The hacker group, which is alleged to be behind the attack on the US service provider Kaseya, is demanding a ransom of 70 million dollars in the form of the digital currency Bitcoin. The collective wrote that on a blog that “REvil” has been running since last year. As tagesschau.de quotes an expert from the cybersecurity company Recorded Future, the entry is real. (Tanja Koch)
List of rubric lists: © Nicolas Armer / dpa
