Hackers coin it to release data

Washington – Last year, a northwestern US county paid $300 000 (about R4.2 million) to recover data locked by hackers, opting like many victims to pay the ransom, despite experts advising against it.

“We had no phones, and no internet, and no computer system,” former Tillamook county commissioner Bill Baertlein said during an online seminar.

Authorities had studied the system, but “we determined that we probably could not fix it”.