A city in Quebec suffered a ransomware cyberattack over the weekend that crippled its servers – and a ransomware group has stepped forward claiming responsibility for the cybercrime.
Mayor Christina Smith of the city of Westmount confirmed the attack in an announcement. Reports said that the attack was spotted Sunday morning by a city employee who noticed a problem with their computer.
“We know we have encrypted servers, but we don’t know who attacked us,” said Westmount head of IT Claude Vallières. “We are still investigating the infected servers, but we have not had any communication with anyone.”
As reported by La Presse, Westmount is a municipality of about 21,000. While the city’s servers were impacted by the encryption malware, its website appears to be unaffected.
IT World Canada said that the LockBit ransomware gang has claimed responsibility for the cyberattack. The group announced that it copied 14 TB of data from the city and has threatened to release it to the public in two weeks unless Westmount pays a ransom.
But Emsisoft threat analyst Brett Callow has advised that LockBit’s claim should not be taken immediately at face value, especially when it comes to the claim that the group had stolen 14 TB of data.
“They’ve exaggerated in the past, and could be doing so again,” Callow told IT World Canada in a statement.
