The Australian state of Tasmania confirmed that around 150,000 individuals and businesses were affected by the hack of Fortra’s GoAnywhere file transfer product.
The theft of data includes information on schoolchildren, and it is not clear what relation the 30,000 identified individuals have to the 150,000 individuals and businesses.
Additionally, Tasmanian Minister for Science and Technology, Madeleine Ogilvie, said that the government has proactively reached out to vulnerable individuals and businesses to ensure they have the support in place.
Further investigations by the cyber team have identified an additional 14,000 individuals whose data may have been compromised. The Clop ransomware group has published stolen information from dozens of companies and organizations.
At the same time, Clop is the only hacking group confirmed to have exploited the vulnerability in the popular GoAnywhere tool, which cybersecurity researchers track as CVE-2023-0669.
Furthermore, Fortra, the company behind GoAnywhere, has been criticized for its response to the fiasco, with customers claiming that the company told them their data was safe when it was not. The Clop attack has stirred criticism from the opposition Labor Party, which has said Tasmania’s Liberal government hasn’t communicated effectively about the crisis and downplayed the sensitivity of the stolen data.
The government continues to urge people to stay alert for any suspicious financial activity or attempted scams.
