The Guardian UK Broadsheet Media Outlet has fallen prey to ransomware attacks that seem to have targeted large portions of offices-based systems.
Although journalists at the newspaper of the center-left have maintained their work remotely and published on its website, the publication has reported that the paper was affected by “a serious IT attack” (which is suspected to be ransomware).
The company said that Tuesday’s attack caused disruption to some of its technology infrastructure. Employees were instructed to stay at home and continue working as normal. The company acknowledged that some of its services behind the scenes have been disrupted, however it said they were confident it would still be able to produce Thursday’s printed newspaper.
It is safe to assume that there will be many tears of joy if the quinoa does not.
Anna Bateson (chief executive of Guardian Media Group) and Katharine Viner (editor-in-chief), told staff that there had been an incident in which our IT networks and systems were affected. While we suspect this is a ransomware attack, we are still looking at all possible options. The technology departments have worked to address all issues. Most of our employees are able to work remotely, just like during the pandemic.
The Guardian – which has broken important UK stories including the phone-hacking scandal and the 1990s cash-for-questions affair – said news organizations around the world have been regular targets for cyberattacks both by criminals and nation states, although at this stage the company said it believed the incident was likely to be a ransomware attack.
Report [PDF] by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), part of the US Treasury, found that the impact of ransomware attacks – measured in Bank Secrecy Act filings – hit $1.2 billion 2021, up 188 percent compared with 2020.
It stated that FinCEN had analyzed ransomware-related BSA files for 2021 and found that the ransomware threat continues to be a serious threat to US critical infrastructure, businesses, as well as the general public. ®