Report: New ransomware found in targeted attacks against health care industry

A unique variant of ransomware that appears to have been designed for and used against health care companies was recently uncovered by a researcher at cybersecurity firm Proofpoint. While most ransomware is sent out in waves to as many people as possible, Proofpoint’s findings instead show that a hacker is carefully developing specially tailored ransomware attacks for hospitals and doctor’s offices. The company has labeled the malware Defray. “At this point, all attacks into which we have visibility have been targeted,” said Kevin Epstein, vice president of threat operations at Proofpoint. “It appears that this ransomware is not for sale, suggesting that it is a personal project.” Proofpoint found only two samples of the Defray ransomware in August. Those samples, however, are likely just a subsegment of all incidents involving this computer virus. Defray has been spread through a small email phishing campaign. The emails contain booby-trapped Microsoft Word documents […]

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