Continental victim of $50 million cyber blackmail


At Continental, the nightmare has become reality. The German business daily Handelsblatt summarized in a few words in his morning briefing the digital disaster that befell Continental. While the American and French judicial authorities announced the arrest of an affiliate of LockBit, the automotive supplier from Hanover was summoned by the same criminal franchise to pay a ransom of 50 million dollars to recover 40 terabytes of stolen data, now for sale on the internet.

Launched in 2019, the LockBit criminal franchise is currently one of the most aggressive extortion and ransomware platforms in the industry. She recently claimed to have hacked into Thales, a claim the company denies despite posting company documents online. She had also attacked this summer at La Poste Mobile and at the South Francilien Hospital Center.

Computer security questioned

Even if the German manufacturer of tires and car parts, which had achieved a turnover of 34 billion euros last year, did not give in to blackmail from cybercriminals, the bill already looks very heavy. According to an analysis of Handelsblatt, who was able to view a sample, the stolen files contain sensitive data from Continental. The German daily thus mentions communications from the supervisory board or investment and strategy plans.

The automotive giant is also already questioned, for example by the Spiegel, about his computer blindness. The volume of stolen data is considered “surprisingly high”, an amount that should have been identified and stopped by security measures, notes the magazine. At the end of August, Continental had indicated that it had repelled a computer attack detected at the beginning of the month, stating that it had full control of its information system and had taken all the necessary defensive measures. It is unclear whether this cyberattack is really the cause of the data leak sold by LockBit.

Risk of loss of trust

As if that weren’t enough, hacking isn’t just about Continental. The company being in close contact with its customers, and the hackers were able to get their hands on data from the manufacturers BMW, Mercedes or Volkswagen.

In addition to the fear of industrial espionage, these companies are now on their guard against the risk of intrusion. Some of them, for example, reset their passwords on a large scale and verified the installation of security updates.

Beyond the technical problem, it will also be necessary to restore confidence, while Continental, as recalled The echoesworked for example for Volkswagen on IT projects.





Source link -97