The Expert Podcast

Just when you thought you'd seen everything with cyber attacks and cyber security, the hackers now have a new trick up their sleeve. Instead of ransoming you to give them money to get back your data or to not release it to the public, they're just filing a complaint with the SEC. Now that there are a lot more regulations for reporting notification disclosures for a hack or a cyber attack against your company, the criminals are using this. The ransomware gang is filing an SEC complaint against companies that refuse to negotiate.

So if you get a complaint from a company that they've downloaded all your customer files or that they've locked up your system, if you refuse to negotiate or give them what they want, they just file a complaint against you. It's almost like a murderer filing a complaint against a victim for letting them murder them. It's crazy, but it works because this tactic is a good way to coerce payments.

It's another really good reason to make sure you have active monitoring and a response team or a response protocol so you know how to handle them. In this example, the Black Cat ransomware gang is abusing the SEC incident reporting rule to put pressure on organizations that refuse to negotiate ransom payments.

The cybercriminals list the company as a defendant on a report for a data leak website that's used to publicly name and shame companies that are compromised. So in addition to all the other risks of having a cyber attack against you—tthe money losses, the internal labor to fix the problem, the ransom you have to pay, even the fines you'd have to pay for penalties—nnow the hackers are pulling out all the stops and taking it one step further.

Make sure you either have coverage for this on your insurance, have a very good cyber security defense plan in place, or have a response protocol so that when something happens, you know how to take action right away to minimize the damage and the losses.