The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), US has issued a warning to businesses and organizations on October 2 regarding threatening cybersecurity issues. But within a few days the city of Carrollton, Texas revealed that it was attacked by cybercriminals on Thursday morning.
As reported, the city stated that they are currently working closely with the state and the federal officials to investigate the hacking incident which impacted the service. They are currently looking for the opportunity to return operations back to normal.
In a statement, the city of Carrollton said, "Currently, we have no reason to believe resident information has been accessed or will be affected. Water, sewer, and trash services are running on schedule and most residents shouldn't experience any interruptions."
However, it should be mentioned that a few days ago FBI has issued 'high-impact' cybersecurity warning stating that "health care organizations, industrial companies and the transportation sector," are also being targeted by cybercriminals.
"Cybercriminals upgrade and change their techniques to make their attacks more effective and to prevent detection," FBI statement read.
Even though every hacker has his own modus operandi, FBI highlighted the three most popular attack techniques that are being observed by the cybercrime experts. It includes email phishing campaigns, remote desktop protocol vulnerabilities and software vulnerabilities.
But to protect the system from unexpected cyberattacks, people need to make sure that their operating systems, software and device firmware are all updated with the latest security patches. The warning also included that the system data should be backed up regularly.
Not only about the attacks, but the FBI also asked organizations not to pay the ransom, demanded by hackers. They said, "paying ransoms emboldens criminals to target other organizations and provides an alluring and lucrative enterprise to other criminals."
A report by Emsisoft revealed that 621 government entities, healthcare service providers and school districts, colleges as well as universities were attacked by ransomware in the US.
All these attacks happened in the first nine months of 2019, topping the current trends in the world of hacking that include attacks via MSPs, bigger ransom demand, cyber insurance, email and Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP).
