Reports have emerged of a developing story which has it that a person (or a group of persons) has hacked into the website of the City of Johannesburg. And they are demanding ransom in Bitcoin.

The report also says the City of Johannesburg has also shut down its billing system as a precautionary measure. This was after a network breach was detected. According to a post on the Twitter account of the City, that network breach led to unauthorized access to its information system.

The City has detected a network breach in its systems ^TK pic.twitter.com/r43iiJiUya

— City of Joburg (@CityofJoburgZA) October 24, 2019

A group called Shadow Kill has claimed responsibility for the act, posting their demands on the city website which include 4.0 Bitcoin to be paid as ransom. This is as reported by eNCA.

Per the hackers’ demands, if the ransom is not paid on or before October 28, all the hijacked data, including some sensitive/classified information, will be uploaded on the internet.

Security experts are currently investigating the matter. The security agents say they have “taken immediate and appropriate actions to reinforce security measures and mitigate any potential impact.” They also say their investigation would be completed within 24 hours.

For now, the City of Johannesburg is being held ransom by a group of hackers who want payment in cryptocurrency and it would be quite interesting to see how the rest of the story pans out.

More to follow shortly…

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