The Australian group Medibank has admitted that hackers had been able to access the personal data of its policyholders.
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Australian police announced on Friday (November 11th) that Russian hackers were behind a cyberattack on an Australian health insurance giant, which affected 9.7 million customers and former customers, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
A “loosely affiliated group of cybercriminals” carried out the cyberattack from Russia where it is based, said Reece Kershaw, an Australian Federal Police official. Medibank, one of the main private health insurance companies in the country, admitted this week that hackers had been able to access the personal data of its policyholders.
After posting a first “sample” of this data on Wednesday, the hackers posted a second on Thursday on a dark web forum – which cannot be found using regular browsers. They contained particularly personal information about hundreds of people.
The first information disclosed appeared to have been selected to cause significant harm, targeting people being treated for drug addiction, sexually transmitted infections or pregnancy terminations. The insurer has so far refused to pay the hackers.