The United States and other G7 countries are warning countries that allow ransomware groups to operate within their borders that they will be held responsible for their inaction.
The warning comes as leaders of the G7 group of countries jointly announced a commitment to tackle what they have described as the global ransomware challenge.
Loaded news
The statement - made by Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US at the G7 summit in Cornwall, England - follows a series of attacks with high profile ransomware.
Among the organizations whose networks have been attacked by ransomware in recent weeks are Colonial Pipeline and food giant JBS.
Colonial Pipeline paid cybercriminals over $ 4 million in bitcoins in exchange for the DarkSide ransomware decryption key, while JBS paid out $ 11 million after being hacked and having its network encrypted by REvil ransomware.
“Working together to face cyberthreats”
The scale of the problem is such that US President Joe Biden and other G7 leaders have pledged to join forces to fight ransomware attacks.
“We agreed to work together to address cyber threats from state and non-state actors, such as ransomware criminal networks, and to hold accountable countries that harbor criminal actors and do not hold them to account,” President Biden warns.
In a joint statement issued following the G7 summit, Russia is expressly called on to redouble its efforts to end cyberattacks and to “identify, disrupt and hold accountable those within its borders who lead ransomware attacks, abuse cryptocurrency to launder ransoms and commit other cybercrimes ”.
Protect against cyber threats
Many of the more notorious ransomware groups are believed to operate from Russia, and cybersecurity experts agree that Russian cybercriminals are allowed to operate, as long as they do not target them. Russian organizations.
The G7 countries are also committed to ensuring that organizations, especially those operating critical infrastructure, are protected against cybersecurity threats like ransomware.
“The international community - both governments and private sector actors - must work together to ensure that critical infrastructure is resilient to this threat, that malicious cyber activity is investigated and prosecuted, that we strengthen our collective cyber defenses and that states tackle the criminal activities that take place within their borders, ”says the White House.
Source: .com
