Hackers demanded ten million dollars on Thursday to stop the disclosure of confidential patient medical data after a cyberattack on a major private health insurance company in Australia, AFP reported, reported by Agerpres.
Medibank, one of Australia’s largest private health insurers, has revealed that hackers accessed the personal data of around 9.7 million of its customers and former customers, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
After releasing the first “sample” of this data on Wednesday, the hackers posted a second “sample” on a dark web forum on Thursday. In particular, it contained personal information about hundreds of people.
It appears that the first information released was selected to cause significant harm to people undergoing treatment for drug addiction, sexually transmitted diseases, or abortions.
“(I) have attached one more file, abortions.csv,” the hackers wrote before detailing their ransom demand. “It’s 10 million US dollars. We can give a discount (…) 1 dollar = 1 customer,” said a dark web forum.
The insurance company has so far refused to pay the ransom to the hackers.
The head of Medibank, David Kochkar, called the hackers’ blackmail “shameful”.
“The use of personal information to extort (money) is a heinous (crime),” he said, adding that “this is an attack on the most vulnerable members of our community.”
(article photo: P Boriboon, Dreamstime.com)
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