He had been contacted by someone who claimed to have hacked into his computer and captured compromising photos from his webcam, as well as screen captures to go along with the photos. To make a really long story short, someone was trying to extort money from my friend. What I wasn’t expecting was my friend’s answer of “I wish.” Nobody wants to be attacked by ransomware, so I knew that my friend must have fallen into a really bad situation, although I couldn’t guess the half of it. At this point, I put two and two together and asked my friend if he had been hit by a ransomware attack. His first question was something to the effect of whether an attacker could cause data loss. Ignoring my question, my friend began to ask me a series of questions about what a hacker realistically could or could not do to a computer. I answered by saying that yes, I do know about bitcoins, and asked what it was that he needed. In doing so, he tried to play it cool, but the simple fact that he had initially said that he had been trying to reach me for days told me that this was no casual inquiry. My friend then proceeded to ask me if I knew anything about bitcoins. Within minutes of regaining a cell signal, however, I received a phone call from a friend who said that he had been trying to reach me for days. Recently, I was traveling and was off of the grid for a while. Let me give you a rather horrifying example. The demand is usually for money (commonly in the form of bitcoins), but an extortionist could conceivably demand just about anything. So what is cyber-extortion? Cyber-extortion can come in many different forms, but at its simplest, it is when someone online threatens some sort of harm unless you meet their demands. Right now, one of the online trends that seem to be gaining traction is cyber-extortion. After all, we have all probably been ridiculed by an online troll at one time or another, and who among us hasn’t had someone online try to scam them? As bad as these activities are, however, things can always be worse. In spite of the countless benefits, however, the Internet also has a way of bringing out the very worst in people. Never before has the entire scope of human knowledge been available for the asking. The hacker then sent an email with a copy of a merger plan scenario and files on one of the firm’s clients and threatened that unless they were wired $250,000 they would not only shut down the firm’s computer systems, they would also publish all the data they obtained from the system.The Internet is probably the most amazing thing ever invented. A hacker based in Russia gained access to their computer system and the confidential information on it. Claim example Smith & Smith, LLP, a midsize law firm, held confidential information on many of their clients, as well as information on merger opportunities they were exploring. Companies who hold trade secrets or confidential information, or who are reliant on access to their computer systems to maintain operations can be particularly vulnerable. Companies can be vulnerable to cyber extortion no matter where they are located, and whether the perpetrator is operating in the U.S. Cyber extortion occurs when a company receives threats to damage or shut down a company’s website, e-mail server, or computer system or threatens to expose electronic data or information belonging to the company unless the company pays the criminal a specific ransom amount.
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