It would seem that ransomware attacks are continuing to cause menace still across the globe with little sign of abating. On 7-Jun-19, it was reported that belgium based ASCO Industries, a global manufacturer of aircraft parts, was severeley disrupted by a ransomware infection. The incident has reportedly disrupted the company’s ability to supply products to customers and impacted roughly 1,000 employees, which have been placed on temporary leave.
ASCO has offices and production centres in Belgium, Germany, Canada, the US, and offices in Brasil and France. It happens to be the spare parts suppliers to companies like Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, and Lockheed Martin and is also into the manufacturing of military based units such as F-35 jets and Rocket launchers. As of the time of this post ASCO had not issued any official statement on their public website about the incident.
Currently, the name of the ransomware is not yet disclosed but news sources close to the incident suggested that the malware which took down the servers of Norsk Hydro three months earlier this year in Mar-19, was the same behind this incident which is the LockerGoga ransomware.
It is also not yet clear what the motivation behind this attack is, whether it is financial gain by a cyber-criminal group or disruption due to some industrual sabotage attempt by an advanced threat actor. Whatever the motivation is, recent trends would suggest that the industrials sector is becoming increasingly a target for ransomware attacks and the track-record so far seems to be in favour of the attackers.
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