North Carolina County Goes Public With Ransomware Attack

A North Carolina county went public with its recent ransomware attack and decision not to pay a ransom, providing a rare look inside such crippling hacks, the vast majority of which are kept under wraps.

Workers for Mecklenburg County, N.C. learned Dec. 5 that several computer networks had been frozen by the LockCrypt ransomware strain. Cybercriminals demanded payment of 2 bitcoin—worth approximately $24,000 at the time—to provide the key to unlock the data on 48 of the county’s 500 computer systems that were encrypted. The county’s data was backed up, one of the best defenses to a ransomware attack.

Transparency ...