Pennsylvania’s state court announced Thursday that it has never received a ransom demand as part of a cyberattack that temporarily shut down some online services and prompted a federal investigation earlier this month.
A so-called “denial of service” attack on the Pennsylvania Administrative Office of Courts website took down some online portals and systems, but they were fully restored this week, officials said.
Officials said the attack did not compromise any data or disrupt the court’s normal schedule of operations.
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A spokesperson for the Court of Justice said the agency had never received a ransom demand from the attackers, had no contact with them, and had never paid anything in response to any kind of demand. He said no.
State Supreme Court Chief Justice Debra Todd said the federal investigation continues.
Neither the courts nor the FBI, nor the federal government’s main cybersecurity agency, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, have identified the attackers. No clear claim of responsibility has been made.
February 21, 2023 at the Pennsylvania Judicial Center, home of the federal courthouse in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
Todd said in a statement that the “serious and serious” attack was “orchestrated by a faceless, nameless hypothetical enemy whose goal is to attack our nation’s infrastructure and orchestrate the shutdown of our state’s justice system.” Ta.
“These anonymous attackers sought to undermine our mission to increase access to justice and disrupt the operation of our court system across the state,” Todd said.
“Denial of service” cyberattacks are common and occur when an attacker floods a target host website or network with so much traffic or requests that the site becomes overwhelmed or crashes.
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The attack comes after the Kansas Judiciary fell victim to a so-called “sophisticated cyberattack” late last year that took months and millions of dollars to recover from. The attack was blamed on a Russia-based group.
Big tech companies Google Cloud, Microsoft, and Amazon Web Services have fallen victim to such attacks in recent years, as have financial institutions. In 2022, some of the airport grounds in the United States were damaged. Some of the largest attacks have been by Russian or Chinese hackers.
Cybersecurity experts say denial-of-service hackers are often state-backed, targeting funds, and may use tactics to hide their identities. Experts say such attacks could also be used to hide the underlying attack, such as a ransomware attack.
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Network experts can thwart attacks by diverting large amounts of Internet traffic.
