Acer Inc., one of the leading PC brands in Taiwan, confirmed Tuesday that its systems were attacked twice by the same group of hackers recently: the first time in India and the second in Taiwan.
While Acer did not identify the hacker, international news outlets named the hackers as the Desorden Group, saying the attacks happened in less than a week of each other.
In a statement posted on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, where the company’ shares are traded, Acer said it detected the hacker attack of its after-sales services systems in India and other systems in Taiwan, but added the second attack did not involve any customer related information.
Acer said it has reported the cyberattacks to law enforcement authorities and related agencies in the two countries, adding the company immediately responded to the attacks by initiating security protocols and conducting a full scan of its systems.
Acer emphasized its operations were not interrupted by the cyberattacks, and the incidents were unlikely to impose any material financial impact on the company.
Tech website ZDNet cited Desorden as saying it conducted the second attack simply to prove “Acer is way behind in its cybersecurity effects on protecting its data and is a global network of vulnerable servers.”
In March, Acer was hit by the REvil hacker group, which announced the breach and asked the company to pay US$50 million in ransom.
According to another tech news website BleepingComputer, it was the highest ransom REvil had ever sought in a ransomware attack. It was unclear whether Acer paid the ransom.
The report said REvil displayed images of allegedly stolen files as proof, including Acer’s financial spreadsheets, bank balances, and bank communications.
Acer is not the only company in Taiwan to have suffered a recent cyberattack.
In December 2020, iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., also known as Foxconn globally, was attacked by ransomware as a hacker stole the company’s unencrypted data and asked for about 1,804.0995 Bitcoins valued at about US$34.69 million, according to BleepingComputer.
In addition, Advantech Co., a major Taiwanese industrial computer supplier, was asked to pay US$14 million in ransom in November 2020 after its servers were hacked and data stolen.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel