Arran Brewery Hits Massive Ransomware Attack – Warned Other Companies to Stay Safe

Hacker attack Arran Brewery using ransomware and lock down their computer system and demand ransom in bitcoin to unlock their system.

It was one of the targeted attacks against Arran Brewery via email that contains attached ransom payload in order to demand the ransom.

Arran Brewery, based on the Isle of Arran – a Scottish island located off the west coast of the country.

An attacker sending fake job application email that contains attached malware along with ransomware payload.

Also Read: Ransomware Attack Response and Mitigation Checklist

Initially, hackers taking advantage of the Arran Brewery in Scotland advertised job vacancies on its site and send the email with an attachment of weaponized PDF.

According to the Gerald Michaluk, MD of Arran Brewery told BBC, “We advertise job vacancies on our website. One such job vacancy was for a credit control and finance assistant post, now filled.

“Out of the blue, we started getting applicants for the post from all over the country and the world.

“I assumed one of my colleagues had advertised the post. However, this was not the case; the attackers had taken our website vacancy and posted it on some international jobs site.

“We were getting three of four emails a day, all with attached CVs. The virus was in amongst the genuine job seekers, and when the CV was opened it took effect.”

The brewery was hit by the Dharma Bip ransomware variant, which crypto-locked and renamed the files on all affected systems, adding a “.bip” extension.

The brewery doesn’t exactly aware of how attackers gained access to its domain controller, but strongly suspects that it fell victim to a phishing attack.

“Cybercriminals demanded 2 bitcoin (£10,227/$13,448 at the time of publication) to hand over the encryption keys needed to recover data. The Scots firm declined to cave into extortion, even though the decision meant accepting the loss of three months worth of sales data from one infected server.” BBC report said.

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