It was recently reported that the personal data of 5 million AirAsia passengers as well as employee information have been leaked through a ransomware attack. AirAsia has just released a response on the matter through Bursa Malaysia.
Responding to reports made by The Edge and The Star, it said that the cyber attack was on redundant systems and did not affect their critical systems. It added that the company had taken all measures to immediately resolve this data incident and prevent such future incidents. AirAsia also said there was no operational or financial impact to the company arising from this.
While AirAsia assured no disruption to its critical systems and operations, it didn’t address concerns about the alleged data leak involving 5 million passengers. There was no mention of the impact of the cyber attack and the airline didn’t confirm or deny if any personal data have been exposed.
According to DataBreaches, AirAsia was a victim of a ransomware attack by the Daixin Team who managed to obtain two CSV files containing 5 million passenger records. The alleged cyber attack took place on 11th and 12th November, and they claimed AirAsia didn’t try to negotiate the ransom amount. A Daixin Team spokesperson told DataBreaches that they have avoided locking up critical files related to flying equipment as part of their avoidance of encrypting or destroying files that could be life-threatening.
Ransomware attacks can cause major disruption to airlines which can leave hundreds if not thousands of passengers stranded. According to Akamai, 71% of organisations in APAC have paid ransoms between USD 100,000 to USD 1 million.
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