fi nancial statements. But it is not all used as one may expect. The hackers target fi nancial services have also come to understand


that monetary information will not give them the economic benefi ts they want. Instead, ransomware gangs are targeting customer data and leaking fi nancial institution employee details such as Personally Identifi able Information


(PII) and Human Resource (HR) data.


Rapid7 found that since April 2020, 82% of disclosures from fi nancial services organisations included customer data while employee PII and HR data was found in 59% of disclosures. It also found that in almost a third of cases, data disclosures included reconnaissance details that hackers could use to further victimise the victimised institution. The hacking itself furthers hacks. Refl ecting Menlo Security’s survey that found respondents feared their employees were the most vulnerable link in the security chain, Rapid7 has seen ransomware groups target individual people and threaten to leak personal information, probably because the gangs are aware that people are the weakest link. One basic protection against ransomware is to backup data, so it exists in more than one location, beyond the reach of hackers’ code. Where ransomware was once simply an extortion operation, money for the return of data, this malware’s use in the fi nancial sector is evolving into the exploitation of employees and leveraging of fi scal data disclosure. The above only deals with conventional fi nancial institutions, cryptocurrency is another world. The fi nancial instrument of choice for hackers and the currency that ransoms are to be paid in, the attack on blockchain fi rm Harmony that saw USD$100 million in crypto stolen raises the question of how long before it is a crypto account that is locked up by ransomware?


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