Technion university targeted by new ransomware group “DarkBit”

This week, Technion Institute of Technology, one of Israel’s leading research universities was attacked by a new ransomware group going by the name ‘DarkBit’. The ransom note left on the university’s systems, demanded 80 Bitcoin or roughly US$ 1,745,200 to release the decryptor to the university while mentioning current events going on in the world like the recent layoffs in the tech industry and the tensions in Israel.

The institution has stated that they are currently carrying out incident response activities to determine the scope and cause of the incident. They also stated that they are coordinating with the relevant authorities. While Technion’s cyber systems may be impacted, the institution has stated that the university’s campus operations continue as normal.

DarkBit has threatened to impose a 30% penalty on top of an already-significant ransom demand should the university not agree to pay up and warned that they’d be putting up any stolen data for sale after five days.