Hackers Hold Entire Hotel for Ransom, Trap Guests in Rooms


luxury hotel in Austria found itself in a bizarre hostage situation recently when hackers managed to access its electronic key system and lock all the hotel guests in their rooms until the hotel agreed to pay a ransom to get its systems back.

According to The Local, the cyber lock-in happened on the first day of the winter season at the Romantik Seehotel Jaegerwirt, a 111-year-old, four-star luxury hotel that has a pool, lake views, and a state-of-the-art electronic key system that turned out to be something hackers could exploit.

On the first day of the winter season this year, hackers accessed the hotel’s IT system and shut down everything, including all the reservation info and the hotel’s electronic key system. Approximately 180 people were staying at the hotel that day, and many of them were locked in their rooms, while others were locked out of theirs.

The hackers wanted 1,500 euros in Bitcoin to release the hotel’s system, and the hotel decided to pay.

"The house was totally booked with 180 guests, we had no other choice. Neither police nor insurance help you in this case,” said managing director Christoph Brandstaetter.
After the hackers were paid, the system went back to working as it was supposed to. But Brandstaetter says the hotel is planning on replacing the hotel’s door locks with old-fashioned ones with real keys.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/hackers-hold-entire-hotel-ransom-213915523.html

Lalasticlala, mynd44, Seun, i don't know if this is the appropriate section to post this, pls help move to the appropriate section.
Respectfully yours

lol

Bad boys on the prowl...

Make Nigeria kidnappers no go dey ask for bitcoin oh

jeffizy:
That is one helluva neat job.
No guns, no physical presence.
And the hotel is considering going back to the old ways.
So interesting.

This reminds me of a movie where, someone in order to avoid the electronic footprint in the use of email to communicate to a fugitive decided to use the old fashioned typewriter to type on paper to be dispatched codedly. The guy passed across the info successfully but his message was gotten by the villains. Guess how? The carbon paper used was fetched from the trash and the message deciphered! Can't remember the title of the movie at the moment.

Moral of the story is that no technology no matter how advanced or crude it might be is infallible.