Gambling giant, Caesars Entertainment has recently reported that it has become a victim of a cyber-attack. The company had no other choice but to pay the requested ransomware in the tens of millions of dollars. But its Ontario operations should be unaffected. In the province, the corporation runs Caesars Windsor Casino and iGaming via two platforms.
As mentioned in Ontario, the company operates one land-based gaming amenity, Caesars Windsor Casino. But the gambling leader is also licensed by the province to offer legal online casino and sports betting. This is provided via its Caesars Palace Online Casino and Caesars Canada Sportsbook. But all of the operations remained unaffected by the attack.
Substantial Security Breach
According to reports by Bloomberg, hackers threatened that they would release the operator’s data. This left the company no choice but to pay millions in ransom money. However, since then the gambling giant has yet to provide an official statement on the topic, but after the news was broken by Bloomberg, the company included the attack in a regulatory filing.
It was revealed that the hacker group responsible for the cyber-attack was Scattered Spider or UNC3944. The group is infamous for its ability to gain access to large corporate networks via social engineering schemes to get users to share personal information. Its attack on Caesars came around August 27 and hackers accessed the company’s system through an outside IT vendor.
It is highly possible that the hackers were able to steal personal information from members of the operator’s popular Caesars Rewards program, including driver’s licenses and social security numbers. They have not accessed land-based casinos and iGaming platforms. The operator said it has taken steps to ensure that stolen data is deleted by the unauthorized actor.
There is no official word on the company’s operations across Canadian social insurance numbers, however, the corporation’s loyalty program is not running in the Great White North. Also, one of the upgrades to its newly launched iCasino platform was that it provides full integration with the Caesars Rewards program available at the company’s many retail properties.
Gateway Casinos Was also a Victim
The Province of Ontario is not a stranger to cyber-attacks, as earlier this year, one of its largest operators of brick-and-mortar casinos, Gateway Casino & Entertainment also suffered a ransomware incident. Back then, tech expert, Carmi Levy commented that a data leak was one of the most probable outcomes of the digital attack. But it was not confirmed by the operator.
Furthermore, the specialist noted the incident and pointed out the need for companies to invest more funds and time in cybersecurity and employee training. he also explained that digital criminals usually send out phishing emails which look legitimate to people inside an organization. These kinds of emails often ask the recipient to download a file which would then access the company’s network.
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