Another European nation hit by hackers, Montenegro grapples with ongoing ransomware attack

According to Cyberscoop, "Multiple Montenegrin government websites remained inaccessible Friday, a week after government officials there said the country’s “critical state infrastructure” had been targeted with an “unprecedented” cyberattacks.

Officials initially blamed the attacks, which came in two waves over the course of the past week or so, on a “coordinated” digital assault from Russian cyber offensive services.

But on Tuesday, the shadowy Cuba Ransomware group, which some researchers believe has Russian members, claimed to have attacked the Parliament of Montenegro, causing more uncertainty about who is behind the crippling series of attacks and what they want to achieve.

Now, the Cuba development points to a case of criminal ransomware and Montenegrin leaders have backed away from blaming Russia. Officials confirmed that Cuba Ransomware was behind the attack and demanded a $10 million ransom."

"Little is known about the people behind Cuba Ransomware group. In April 2021, incident responders with Israeli security companies Security Joes and Profero reported having talked with Cuba Ransomware attackers “who over the course of the investigation, we discovered are Russian speakers, due to a simple translation mistake on their part.” The responders were unable to approximate the attackers’ location, they said."

Article: https://www.cyberscoop.com/montenegro-ransomware-attack/