Wood River Police Department of Illinois Hit With Ransomware
According to The Telegraph, on March 5, 2017 the Wood River Police Department was hit with a malicious phishing attack that included ransomware. The phishing attack was successful, infecting one computer. However, the issues that presented after the attack set off red flags for the officers. This led for the officers to take the infected PC offline immediately. By doing so, they were able to avoid further distribution of the ransomware throughout their systems.
The IT department collaborated with a third-party agency and was able to get the PC cleaned, and all bugs removed. Wood River Police Department’s systems are fully functional, and it does not appear any information was accessed during the attack.
The specific ransomware variant used was not disclosed, nor was the ransom demand. Fortunately, due to the department’s quick response, the remediation process did not take an extensive amount of time.
To see a full list of ransomware attacks that have taken place in 2017, you can click here. We have also created a ransomware map, see below, of the ransomware attacks that have taken place in the U.S.
