Garmin Ransomware attack?

[tball]

Really? It's still down here.

Yep, still working from Colorado. I bet they are working some magic with Cloudflare to bring it back up in an orderly manner so they don't get overwhelmed when everyone reconnects.

I was trying to check from elsewhere with Tor and saw this which I thought was a good idea and I didn't know was possible. No Tor for you!

Sound like with a paid Cloudflare plan you can block Tor as a country:

Blocking VPNs and Proxies

So I have seen many Cloudflare websites block out access to VPNs, proxies and people masking their connection. I have a free plan, is it possible to block VPNs and Proxies with Cloudflare this way? Or can I use my .htaccess? How can this be done?

community.cloudflare.com

 

[Wasatchman]

sicne they are public, they will have to divulge at least the important details.

Actually that is not necessarily true, even as a public company.

 

[RobSN]

Except that I have often wondered whether the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act might apply to ransomware. If one pays the ransom, one is effectively bribing a likely foreign entity, n'est-ce pas?

 

[scott43]

Except that I have often wondered whether the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act might apply to ransomware. If one pays the ransom, one is effectively bribing a likely foreign entity, n'est-ce pas?

Heh.. There was quite the kerfuffle here about that..how do you do businesses in foreign countries when bribery is endemic? Apparently our answer is, we don't.. Bully for us hey????!!

 

[cantunamunch]

Heh.. There was quite the kerfuffle here about that..how do you do businesses in foreign countries when bribery is endemic? Apparently our answer is, we don't.. Bully for us hey????!!

Send your corporate lawyers to USAian subsidiary setup school?

 

[scott43]

With some off-shore Panama setup to prevent people from figuring out that, oh, that's actually an arm of the Canadian gov't...

 

[Pequenita]

Except that I have often wondered whether the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act might apply to ransomware. If one pays the ransom, one is effectively bribing a likely foreign entity, n'est-ce pas?

Not sure if the FCPA would apply, but there is a fair argument that paying off an international entity in a ransomware attack could constitute transacting with international crime org.

 

[Wasatchman]

Not sure if the FCPA would apply, but there is a fair argument that paying off an international entity in a ransomware attack could constitute transacting with international crime org.

Yeah. But who knows what goes on behind the scenes with things like this that is never publicly disclosed.

And some companies do violate the FCPA at times, some of them even eventually get caught doing so and pay a fine.

 

[Doug Briggs]

Doesn't affect me. I still hope they paid the hitman, on principle.

Under what principle would you consider paying an extortionist as appropriate? Edit: Or do you mean, you hope they paid a hitman to eradicate the extortionist?

Just changed my password. In CO the servers are back up.

The joy of MAC, generates secure passwords and then stores them for use across all devices.

@Unpiste I started doing the same thing a few years back. my mothers maiden name, first car I owned and dogs name are totally disconnected from any semblance to the question.

It isn't unique to Macs. I use password tools all the time on my PCs. They sync across all the PCs I choose.

sicne they are public, they will have to divulge at least the important details.

Presuming that Garmin accepts credit cards, they will be following the protocols of PCI. PCI compliance requires the attacked entity to notify it's customers of any exfiltration of data. They have months to evaluate and determine if exfiltration has in fact occurred. Whether they have to make the details public in general is a topic for someone else to verify.

 

[Jwrags]

I noticed my rides from last week had uploaded to Garmin Connect yesterday morning. Interestingly, my bike computer was turned off so the data must have been floating around somewhere for days before it showed up on Connect. My Connect app still says it is down for maintenance and the rides have yet to push over to Strava.

 

[François Pugh]

Under what principle would you consider paying an extortionist as appropriate? Edit: Or do you mean, you hope they paid a hitman to eradicate the extortionist?

The 2nd option.

 

[Doug Briggs]

The 2nd option.

I was hoping that was what you meant.

 

[raytseng]

Under what principle would you consider paying an extortionist as appropriate? Edit: Or do you mean, you hope they paid a hitman to eradicate the extortionist?

Ha, if you've watched as many grifter movies as me; you know the Hitman is in on the scam from the beginning, and paying the Hitman to kill the hacker is just part of the long con [aka a faked death]. You not only hand your money over, but you did it voluntarily and felt great about it too.

 

[crgildart]

Just curious how many people would be OK with all their Garmin data gone with no compensation from Garmin for losing it? Or, another way, what are folks paying Garmin via the app to store and manage that data? Wouldn't you want a refund on the months where that data was no longer available? If that adds up to more than 10 million dollars Garmin pays the ransom. Because, seeing this happen to at least two companies I have close ties with IT folks at, recovering their data without paying the ransom wasn't possible. So it's either start over with all data GONE or pay the ransom.

 

[François Pugh]

Ha, if you've watched as many grifter movies as me; you know the Hitman is in on the scam from the beginning, and paying the Hitman to kill the hacker is just part of the long con [aka a faked death]. You not only hand your money over, but you did it voluntarily and felt great about it too.

Yes. If you want something done right, do it yourself. Also if you don't want to get caught, STFU about it.

 

[cantunamunch]

Well it's back on here. No idea how the aviation world is shaking out.

 

[scott43]

Well it's back on here. No idea how the aviation world is shaking out.

Back to the sextant I suppose..

 

[Jwrags]

Just curious how many people would be OK with all their Garmin data gone with no compensation from Garmin for losing it? Or, another way, what are folks paying Garmin via the app to store and manage that data? Wouldn't you want a refund on the months where that data was no longer available? If that adds up to more than 10 million dollars Garmin pays the ransom. Because, seeing this happen to at least two companies I have close ties with IT folks at, recovering their data without paying the ransom wasn't possible. So it's either start over with all data GONE or pay the ransom.

Honestly it would not bother me at all since my data is all pushed to Strava and Map My Run so in reality it is not lost. I do not pay Garmin anything for the service other than buying their device.

 

[scott43]

Honestly it would not bother me at all since my data is all pushed to Strava and Map My Run so in reality it is not lost. I do not pay Garmin anything for the service other than buying their device.

Yeah I personally couldn't care less. It's really more of a novelty to me... No matter how many times I look I'm still 273 out of 300 up the same hill...

 

[Unpiste]

Honestly it would not bother me at all since my data is all pushed to Strava and Map My Run so in reality it is not lost. I do not pay Garmin anything for the service other than buying their device.

The price of the service is built in to the cost of the device, so you're paying one way or another. At least Garmin devices actually work without the online service.

Just curious how many people would be OK with all their Garmin data gone with no compensation from Garmin for losing it? Or, another way, what are folks paying Garmin via the app to store and manage that data? Wouldn't you want a refund on the months where that data was no longer available? If that adds up to more than 10 million dollars Garmin pays the ransom. Because, seeing this happen to at least two companies I have close ties with IT folks at, recovering their data without paying the ransom wasn't possible. So it's either start over with all data GONE or pay the ransom.

I think this is the wrong way to look at it, though. If the cost to Garmin of losing whatever data was encrypted would have been more than $10 million, that's an argument for why Garmin should have had a proper backup strategy in the first place, not for paying a ransom which ultimately hurts the entire industry.

That's also an argument for putting hefty fines in place for anyone who does pay such a ransom. The cost of a ransom like this is more than just the $10 million, and it's not only Garmin that's paying it. Garmin should not be able to make that choice for the industry unless they're willing to pay what it ultimately costs for everyone affected, and that's very difficult to quantify.

It's the same problem you have with any negative externality.