July 1, 2024 at 12:59AM
Indonesia’s president has ordered an audit of government data centers following a ransomware attack that highlighted the lack of data backups and resulted in widespread disruption to digital services. The attack used a variant of the LockBit malware, and the government is refusing to pay the ransom, instead focusing on decrypting the data. Moreover, it was revealed that 98 percent of the data stored in one of the compromised data centers was not backed up due to optional usage of available backup capacity, which will become mandatory in the future.
Based on the meeting notes, key takeaways include:
– President Joko Widodo has ordered an audit of government datacenters after a ransomware attack on the Temporary National Data Center revealed that most of the data was not backed up.
– The ransomware attack used a fresh variant of the LockBit malware called Brain Cipher, which resulted in widespread disruption of digital services and held data hostage for 131 billion Rupiah (US$8 million).
– The government has communicated that it does not intend to pay the ransom and is instead attempting to decrypt the data.
– The head of the Financial and Development Supervisory Agency announced the audit order after a closed-door government meeting, and the National Cyber and Encryption Agency admitted that 98% of the data stored in one of the compromised data centers had no backup.
– Chair of the First Commission of the People’s Representative Council criticized the lack of backup as a “stupidity issue” and highlighted that backup capacity is available but was not used due to budget constraints. However, in the future, it will become mandatory for government agencies to use the backup capacity.
– Vice President Ma’ruf Amin attributed the severity of the attack to the unification of institutions and ministry data, which led to devastating impacts once hacked.
These takeaways provide a clear summary of the key points discussed during the meeting. Let me know if there’s anything else you need.