Wednesday, November 16, 2016 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Business attacked by ransom virus
By Jim Cornelius
News Editor
It was a sickening punch
in the gut.
Last week, one of the staff
at Lakeview Millworks in
Sisters told owner/operator
Brad King that she couldn’t
get into some of her files.
King investigated.
“My jaw dropped as I real-
ized that a lot of files were
frozen,” he told The Nugget.
He found encryption that
included a particular word:
Thor. He contacted the com-
pany he uses for tech support
and got bad news: “They
said, ‘Oh my gosh — you
guys have gotten the Thor
virus.’ We were virtually
shut down; completely shut
down.”
The virus not only freezes
files — it holds the owner
of those files for ransom. A
“ransom note” was embed-
ded throughout the system.
King was told to go to a web-
site where he was instructed
on how to purchase bitcoin to
pay the ransom. The hijack-
ers wanted $2,800.
“My first gut reaction
was ‘oh my gosh, we’re shut
down, we can’t operate —
we have to pay the ransom,’”
King said.
His technical consultants
advised against it.
“‘We don’t pay terror-
ists,’ was the comment,”
King recalled. “And there’s
no guarantee that they won’t
do it again.”
In fact, the technicians
told him, a Bend company
paid the ransom, then was hit
again three times in a month.
Everything to do with the
company’s operations was
affected.
“We went into crisis man-
agement,” King said.
Hours of work went into
reassembling data from
saved trash boxes, and tech-
nicians scrubbed and rebuilt
the system. A week after the
attack, King and his staff
were still working to get past
its effects.
“We’re not done,” he said.
“We came to the conclusion
that we were going to lose a
lot of data.”
King doesn’t know how
the virus got into his com-
puter system. It may have
been planted by an attach-
ment to an email. Such
attachments are cleverly
disguised to resemble busi-
ness emails. For example,
a “confirmation” can be a
malicious attachment. And
in King’s business there are
“confirmations coming and
going all day long.”
Antivirus software is not
an adequate protection.
“We have antivirus soft-
ware,” King said. “It blew
through that.”
The first line of defense
is to simply view each email
skeptically and err on the
side of caution if something
looks “off.”
“Don’t open it,” King
advised. “If you don’t know
who it’s coming from, don’t
open it. That’s the only thing
that everybody’s telling me
we can do.”
Complicating security
precautions is the fact that
people’s address books can
be hacked, so you may get
malicious emails from an
address you recognize. The
best policy is to avoid open-
ing any suspicious attach-
ment. Confirm with the
sender that it is legitimate.
Multiple and varied back-
up systems can help recover
data if a whole system is
compromised.
Such attacks are hard to
trace and most likely come
from overseas. It is a criminal
enterprise that evolves and
changes quickly to exploit
any vulnerability. And its
effects can be devastating.
5
City seeks planning
commission members
The City of Sisters is
accepting applications for
three “in-city” volunteers to
serve on the City of Sisters
Planning Commission.
The terms would expire in
June 2020.
The Planning Commis-
sion’s purpose is to review
major land-use applications;
advise the Sisters City Coun-
cil on planning policies as
well as needed changes to
the comprehensive plan and
development code.
The City of Sisters encour-
ages interested parties to
apply for the opening by
completing an application by
5 p.m. on December 2.
The Planning Commission
regularly meets in Sisters City
Hall at 5:30 p.m. on the third
Thursday of the month. There
may be additional meetings
scheduled and sub-committee
assignments.
Applications are avail-
able at Sisters City Hall, 520
E. Cascade Ave., or at www.
ci.sisters.or.us. Send applica-
tions and résumés to the fol-
lowing address: Community
Development Department
(Attn: Patrick Davenport,
Community Development
Director), P.O. Box 39, Sis-
ters, OR 97759. For more
information call Patrick Dav-
enport at 541-323-5219.
The City of Sisters is
also accepting applications
for volunteers to serve on a
Project Advisory Committee
(PAC) to update the City of
Sisters Transportation Sys-
tem Plan (TSP). The City
encourages interested parties
to contact Nicole Abbenhuis,
Public Works Operations
Coordinator by 5 p.m. on
December 2, at nabbenhuis@
ci.sisters.or.us, or by calling
541-323-5220.
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541-549-6566
484 W. Washington Ave., Ste. B