Ransomware remains one of the main cybersecurity threats for any individual or company. Vulnerability analysis specialists report a severe ransomware infection that has paralyzed all computer operations in Nunavut, a remote Canadian territory.

Through a statement, the local government said: “All government services that depend on access to digital resources have been affected by a sophisticated infection” ·

At the moment, basic public services, such as electricity, have not been compromised, said Premier Joe Savikataaq; "Our vulnerability analysis team has informed us that there may be some failures when our systems are restored," the premier added. However, it is anticipated that the restoration of the systems could be a highly complex process for the administration of Nunavut, an area that includes a large territorial area (almost 2 million km²), but has only 35,000 inhabitants.

Although the region's government did not explicitly mention what kind of computer threat it is facing, local media agreed to a copy of the ransom note found in Nunavut systems, which is in fact identical to the note delivered in the infections of the Dope lPaymer ransomware.

The vulnerability analysis specialists of the security firm Emsisoft believe that this incident could be related to ransomware attacks detected in government organizations in different US territories. According to these reports, ransomware attacks in the US have decreased significantly, so the attackers could be looking for a new victim, in this case, the municipalities in Canada.

"Organizations in the US have increasingly better protection measures against these incidents, so threat actors could move their operations against other less complex objectives," says the company's report.


This has been a hectic week start on cybersecurity issues for many companies and government agencies in various parts of the world. Just a few hours ago, specialists from the International Cyber ​​Security Institute (IICS) reported what appears to be a ransomware campaign against some organizations; one of the first victims was the radio station Cadena SER , whose listeners reported constant failures in the transmissions.