An Unimaginable Ransomware Attack on Veolia and Southern Water Companies

In the age of cybersecurity, Veolia is famous as one of the largest & mightiest private players in the water sector across the globe. One of the noteworthy things about this water company is that it provides tens of millions of people with water as well as wastewater services.

You may have read the important notice that was posted on its website regarding the disclosure of the secrets by Veolia North America. This company exposed that the last week ransomware hit its Municipal Water division. As a consequence of this incident, the company pulled down all of its targeted backend systems along with servers. This way, they could be successful in protecting their online bill payment systems from unwanted disruptions. In such circumstances, any company can rely on TTB Antivirus software for a bright future.

As per the statement of Veolia, “It seems that this incident is constrained to our internal back-end systems at Veolia North America and the matter of worry is that there is unavailability of any valid evidence of the effect of this mishappening on our water or wastewater treatment operations.

It is a matter of surprise that the water company has also made the decision that the personal data of a restricted number of individuals may have been settled. The firm will notify the number of the affected people.

You will be shocked to hear that none of the recognized ransomware groups come ahead to take responsibility for the attack that occurred on Veolia. It has come to the notice that across the pond, a renowned ransomware group made Southern Water its target. It offers water services to around 2.5 million customers as well as wastewater services to almost 4.7 million customers residing in the South of England. The company issued a statement on Tuesday about the confirmation of the identification of the dubious activities on its systems and also the launch of the investigation.

As per the statement given by the ransomware group namely- Black Basta, truly a listed Southern Water, it has been claimed to have stolen the 750 GB of files. These files include an individual's confidential data and corporate documents. In the meantime, the hackers posted a range of screenshots. These screenshots demonstrate that they acquired detected document scans including- passports and licenses of the driver. Furthermore, they also obtained other documents that contained sensitive information.

In the meantime, cybercriminals are terrified to make the stolen data public within five days in case Southern Water declines to pay a specific amount of ransom. The water utility is inquiring into the claims but the matter of worry is that there is no such piece of evidence that can cause a significant impact on the customer relationship or financial systems. In its words, “ Our services are not influenced and are also functioning normally.”

The evil-intentioned cyber actors rapidly attacked the water sector located in the West. And the hackers believe that they were concerned with the civil officials of Iran last year. In this period, they aimed at the water provisions of the industrial control systems situated in the United States of America.

Last but not least, a cyberattack targeted all concerned systems of a small utility located in Ireland. As a consequence, there was a crucial obstruction that was responsible for the condition of the individuals to survive hard without water for two days.