Operators of Clop ransomware stole data from Stanford and Maryland Universities

The personal data of employees and financial reports of the Stanford University School of Medicine, the University of Maryland and the University of California fell into the hands of the operators of the Clop ransomware virus.

According to university representatives, the Accellion File Transfer Appliance is to blame for the data breach. Apparently, a solution designed to securely store and transfer files turned out to be far from secure. The University of Maryland said in a statement:

“We discovered the hack last week when hackers released some data to prove that they had penetrated our systems.”

Representatives from Stanford Medical School said that attackers were able to gain access to the names of employees, their residential addresses and their email addresses, social security numbers and financial records. The statement of the educational institution emphasizes:

“The University of California discovered the hack along with other universities, government departments and private companies across the country. The attack used the Accellion solution. The company’s solutions are used by many organizations to securely transfer files, and attackers were able to gain unauthorized access through the vulnerability of the Accellion file transfer service. ”

Also, a vulnerability in Accellion products led to hacks at the University of Colorado and the University of Miami. It is not yet clear whether the hacks were carried out exclusively by the Clop hacker group, or whether third-party hacking groups were involved. In a statement, Accellion and Mandiant associate the hacks with the FIN11 group. It is also unknown whether offers to buy the data were sent to universities.

Recall that at the end of last year, the Clop group hacked into the infrastructure of the Symrise perfume manufacturer and stole more than 500 GB of data. Then the ransom amount was also not named.

Telegram channel!