A small print shop in the north-west of the US has been the victim of a ransomware attack.
The shop’s owner, JC Penney, said that his business was in the middle of a large-scale hackathon.
“The shop’s been compromised by a malicious actor who’s using the same technology that we’ve been using for over three years,” he said.
“We’ve been dealing with these problems in this way for over two years.”
He said he had lost over $1m in revenue since the attack began.
“There is no way for us to recover, no way to recover our customer’s funds,” he told Al Jazeera.
“It’s really devastating for us and it’s really depressing for the entire community, because we’re in this kind of situation every day,” he added.
“But we’re doing everything we can to keep the shop open and running.”
In the past year, cyber criminals have exploited the ransomware attacks to steal personal data and extort money from victims, including celebrities.
This is a new and highly sophisticated form of ransomware that attacks computer systems with a “decryption key” that is hardcoded in the code.
A ransom is paid when the computer’s hard drive is destroyed.
The ransomware can take hours to complete.
When the victim pays the ransom, the data is deleted from the hard drive and replaced with an encrypted copy of the file.
This encrypts the data, preventing the thief from decrypting the file and stealing the money.
According to the US Department of Homeland Security, more than 2,000 ransomware attacks have been reported worldwide since March 2018.
The US has reported more than 6,000 attacks and nearly 5,000 deaths since then.
But the number of attacks has also dropped in recent years, from more than 5,200 in 2018 to about 2,500 in 2019.
“I have not experienced anything like this before,” said Chris Stadtmiller, CEO of the anti-ransomware firm Locky.
Stadmiller said Locky was working on a new tool to help businesses protect themselves against ransomware. “
When we had the ransomware crisis, we were very focused on stopping the ransomware, but now we are looking to reduce the threat as well.”
Stadmiller said Locky was working on a new tool to help businesses protect themselves against ransomware.
“Right now, we are trying to get a new piece of technology to help us understand this malware, and that’s called a decryption key,” he explained.
So if we are able to decrypt it, it will tell us if there’s any data on that hard drive that we could be able to read,” he continued. “
So this piece of code, which we call the decryption code, is encrypted with a decrypted version of the ransomware.
So if we are able to decrypt it, it will tell us if there’s any data on that hard drive that we could be able to read,” he continued.
“If there is, we know that there is data on the hard drives, and if there isn’t, we won’t be able read the data.”
He explained that he believed Locky had successfully used the technology to decrypt data from around 150,000 devices, but it would be difficult to verify that since the data was not encrypted.
“Most of the devices that we have used for decryption have had this encrypted decryption system, and some of those devices are actually in use right now,” he noted.
“To decrypt all of that data would take a significant amount of time.
But with this new tool, we’re going to be able get that decryption in front of us.”
Stadsmiller added that Locky’s solution was “not perfect”, but was effective at blocking ransomware attacks.
“Our solution does not block ransomware from continuing to run, and our software can block ransomware as well,” he confirmed.
“This new tool can be used by companies that have a high volume of devices that are infected, or by companies who have large amounts of data on their systems that are potentially susceptible to ransomware.”
He also said that Lockys approach was “very robust”, and could be used to detect the spread of ransomware.
In addition to its ransomware protection, Locky said it had been helping businesses reduce their ransomware risks by providing advice on how to avoid ransomware attacks, which the firm said could cost around $50,000 in the short term.
“Locky has a long track record of being a leader in the ransomware field,” it added.
According in its most recent quarterly earnings, Lockys revenue increased by $12.6m to $11.7m, driven by increased customer engagement, an increase in the number and types of infections and a reduction