Hackers Stole Secret Data of the World’s Biggest Celebrities
By Marko Vidrih on The Capital
The ransomware team threatens to publish 1 terabyte of materials relating to the legal secrets of the world’s biggest music and film stars.
These materials cover dozens of music and movie stars, including Lady Gaga, Elton John, Robert De Niro and Madonna. More precisely, extortionists threaten the well-known New York law firm Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks, which has this data.
The hacker group REvil, also known as Sodinokibi, threatens to release about 756 GB of stolen data in nine stages.
Among the stolen data are confidential contracts, phone numbers, emails, personal correspondences and much more. The company is required an amount in bitcoins, which has not yet been disclosed.
The Cointelegraph portal reported that the hackers’ site actually posted screenshots of the legal contracts of Madonna, Christina Aguilera, and even screenshots of the Grubman Shire folders.
Brett Callow from information security firm Emsisoft said the theft of such data could be very sad since law firms keep very confidential information about their clients.
Callow compared these screenshots to the “kidnapper sending a pinky finger.”
“The data published so far would seem to simply be a warning shot,” Callow said. “Should the firm not pay, whatever data the criminals the criminals may have obtained will be published online, probably in instalments in order to gradually ramp up the pressure.”
REvil members previously attacked a number of organizations. So, it is known that as a result, Travelex was forced to pay $2.3 million to restore its files.
Author: Marko Vidrih
Featured image credit: Wikipedia
