San Francisco’s transport agency has been hit by a hack attack that led to customers being able to travel for nothing. The hackers have made a ransom demand of 100 Bitcoin, which amounts to about $70,000 (£56,000 ; €66,000).  As a precaution, staff shut off all ticketing machines on the network.

Source: BBC Technology News

Date: November 29th, 2016

Link: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-38127096

Discussion

1) This hack is an example of “ransomware”.  This approach is a bit more unusual in that the hacker is making a service available to customers for free when they normally would have to pay, thereby depriving a company (or in this case a transit authority) of revenue.  How should a company like SF’s Transportation Authority prevent this from happening?

2) Is Bitcoin, a digitally untraceable currency, a good idea?