FBI and Australia ACSC agencies warn of ongoing Avaddon ransomware attacks

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The FBI and Australian Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) warn of an ongoing Avaddon ransomware campaign targeting organizations worldwide.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) are warning of an ongoing Avaddon ransomware campaign targeting organizations worldwide in multiple industries, including government, finance, energy, manufacturing, and healthcare.

The alert published by the ACSC provides a list of countries under attack which includes the US, UK, Germany, France, China, Italy Brazil, India, UAE, France, and Spain.

“The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) is aware an ongoing ransomware campaign utilising the Avaddon Ransomware malware. This campaign is actively targeting Australian organisations in a variety of sectors.” reads the alert published by ACSC. “The ACSC is aware of several instances where the Avaddon ransomware has directly impacted organisations within Australia.”

This advisory includes details about Techniques, Tools, and Procedures (TTPs) associated with the Avaddon ransomware group.

The group, like other ransomware gangs, uses a ‘double extortion’ model to force victims into paying the ransom.
The gang threatens to publish the victim’s data and also use DDoS attacks against the victim (triple extortion).

The average ransom payment demanded by Avaddon affiliates is roughly $40,000 worth of Bitcoins.

The ACSC also provided the following recommendations:

Patch operating systems and applications, and keep antivirus signatures up to date.
Scan emails and attachments to detect and block malware, and implement training and processes to identify phishing and externally-sourced emails.
Maintain offline, encrypted backups of data and regularly test your backups. Regularly conduct backup procedures and keep backups offline or in separated networks.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, Avaddon)

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Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.