Garmin, owner of the popular inReach system that provides satellite connectivity to backcountry adventurers, was the victim of a cyber attack over the weekend.
On July 23 the company reported they were “experiencing an outage” that mostly affected customers of Garmin’s wearable fitness trackers, who were unable to upload data. The inReach system was impacted, but did not become unavailable over the weekend. It could have left backcountry customers out of touch, but the breach only affected billing services, which are now back online.
The outage could have affected pilots who rely on Garmin products for flight plans, but only if they hadn’t downloaded the most recent navigational data which was released on July 9. Some news outlets reported that pilots were grounded, but Garmin refuted that as inaccurate.
The attackers allegedly demanded $10 million in ransom for the data, as reported by Forbes. Tech security news outlet Bleeping Computer said they confirmed with multiple sources that the attack used WastedLocker Ransomware, which is attributed to the Russian cyber crime group Evil Corp.
Garmin closed down affected services worldwide to prevent the spread of the ransomware on Thursday morning. By Monday July 27, they were back on line. Media relations at Garmin confirmed they were the victim of a cyber attack, but would not confirm who the attackers were or if they paid the ransom.
Garmin assured customers they had “no indication” that customer data was breached.
READ MORE: Russian hackers seeking to steal COVID-19 vaccine data: intel agencies
READ MORE: Twitter racing to unravel mystery cyberattack
Do you have something to add to this story or something else we should report on? Email: zoe.ducklow@blackpress.ca
Like us on <a href="https://www.facebook.com/northislandgazette/
” target=”_blank”>Facebook and follow us on <a href="https://twitter.com/NIGazette
” target=”_blank”>Twitter.
