Newcastle University is being held to ransom after cyber criminals hacked into its systems at the start of September.
The group behind the attack are known as 'DoppelPaymer' and have been previously linked to an attack on Elon Musk's companies SpaceX and Tesla.
The attack on the university was reported as a "cyber incident" which shutdown a number of its IT systems and took place on 4 September. At around 10:00 that same day, a backup file was taken, the university said.
The criminals have posted some of this data, which concerns students and staff members, on the dark web, according to the group's Twitter page, with a threat of more to come if they don't pay the ransom.
"Dear students of the New Castle University Congratulations with an upcoming release of your personal data," the tweet read. "What a great start of a new educational year #doppelpaymer #ransomware #malware #doppleleaks"
The university said it had alerted the Information Commissioner's Office and the police. According to its website, it could take "several weeks" to address its IT issues. As such, many services will remain offline. Third-party security experts have been drafted in, the university confirmed, and an investigation into the attack and the extent of the damage is underway.
The attack on Newcastle University follows another on Northumbria University, which had to cancel exams and shutdown its clearing hotline due to IT disruption. Although the method of attack wasn't specified in the Northumbria case, Newcastle has been reportedly hit with ransomware, which is becoming increasingly common for universities in 2020.
The DoppelPaymer group are said to also offer their services for others to use, similar to the 'ransomware as a service' (RaaS) operation run by the Netwalker group, which has reportedly made over $29 million since March.
-
NHS set for huge tech investment boost in latest spending reviewNews The government spending review will fund the NHS App, the single patient record, the Federated Data Platform, and other initiatives
-
Everything we know so far about the United Natural Foods cyber attackNews The attack on United Natural Foods, a major US distributor, severely disrupted systems
-
‘I take pleasure in thinking I can rid society of at least some of them’: A cyber vigilante is dumping information on notorious ransomware criminals – and security experts say police will be keeping close tabsNews An anonymous whistleblower has released large amounts of data allegedly linked to the ransomware gangs
-
It's been a bad week for ransomware operatorsNews A host of ransomware strains have been neutralized, servers seized, and key players indicted
-
Everything we know about the Peter Green Chilled cyber attack
News A ransomware attack on the chilled food distributor highlights the supply chain risks within the retail sector
-
Scattered Spider: Who are the alleged hackers behind the M&S cyber attack?News The Scattered Spider group has been highly active in recent years
-
Ransomware attacks are rising — but quiet payouts could mean there's more than actually reported
News Ransomware attacks continue to climb, but they may be even higher than official figures show as companies choose to quietly pay to make such incidents go away.
-
Cleo attack victim list grows as Hertz confirms customer data stolen – and security experts say it won't be the lastNews Hertz has confirmed it suffered a data breach as a result of the Cleo zero-day vulnerability in late 2024, with the car rental giant warning that customer data was stolen.
-
‘Phishing kits are a force multiplier': Cheap cyber crime kits can be bought on the dark web for less than $25 – and experts warn it’s lowering the barrier of entry for amateur hackersNews Research from NordVPN shows phishing kits are now widely available on the dark web and via messaging apps like Telegram, and are often selling for less than $25.
-
Healthcare systems are rife with exploits — and ransomware gangs have noticedNews Nearly nine-in-ten healthcare organizations have medical devices that are vulnerable to exploits, and ransomware groups are taking notice.
