A Bold Move - Ransomware Gangs are now starting to threaten the Customers of Compromised Organizations

We live in a world where the threat of a cyberattack is always present. We have to constantly educate colleagues, students and ourselves on how to spot threats and what to do when we discover them. As if that is not hard enough, cybercriminals are using a new tactic to accomplish their malicious goals – they’re reaching out directly to customers of the companies they have compromised.

Corporate victims of cyberattacks now have more pressure than ever to meet the demands of malicious threat actors. With cybercriminals being so bold as to reach out directly to an organizations customers, businesses now have just one more thing they have to account for when trying to mitigate the risk of cyberattacks.

According to a report from Bleeping Computer, the Clop ransomware gang decided not only to threaten the hacked organizations they compromised, but also their customers by directly emailing them after they obtained their email addresses that had been found in the data which they had stolen.

Some of the organizations whose customers were contacted by the malicious ransomware gang included a bank, a manufacturer of business jets, and an online maternity clothing store.

In the email communication to customers, the ransomware gang encourages customers to apply pressure to the targeted organization to pay a ransom – or personal data will be released.

A sample email one customer received reads as follows:

“Good day! If you received this letter, you are a customer, buyer, partner or employee of <victim organization>. The company has been hacked, data has been stolen and will soon be released as the company refuses to protect its peoples' data. We inform you that information about you will be published on the darknet ( <link> ) if the company does not contact us. Call or write to this store and ask to protect your privacy!!!!”

It's hard enough to mitigate the risk of ransomware. Now, this new technique used by threat actors is proof that cyber threats are continuing to evolve. Ransomware went from attacks that encrypted your data until you paid a ransom, to threatening an organizations customers – a pretty bold move.

Story via Tripwire