On Aug. 11, Brian Fung for CNN Business reported that “Accenture, the global consulting firm, has been hit by the LockBit ransomware gang, according to the cybercriminal group's website. Accenture (ACN)'s encrypted files will be published by the group on the dark web on Wednesday unless the company pays the ransom, LockBit claimed, according to screenshots of the website reviewed by CNN Business and Emsisoft, a cybersecurity firm.”
Further, “Stacey Jones, an Accenture spokesperson, confirmed a cybersecurity incident to CNN Business on Wednesday, but did not explicitly acknowledge a ransomware attack.”
Jones said in a statement that “Through our security controls and protocols, we identified irregular activity in one of our environments. We immediately contained the matter and isolated the affected servers. We fully restored our affected systems from back up. There was no impact on Accenture's operations, or on our clients' systems.”
According to Fung, “The LockBit ransomware gang first emerged in September 2019, according to an Emsisoft profile of the group. LockBit, like many other ransomware gangs, leases its malicious software to third-party criminal affiliates who then receive a cut of ransoms in exchange for planting the code onto victim networks.”
In 2020, Interpol advised of a spike in attacks using the LockBit malicious software. “Major victims of the group include Merseyrail, a U.K. rail network, and the Press Trust of India, an Indian news organization, according to Emsisoft,” Fung wrote.
