More than three weeks later, the ransomware attack on Cloudstar is still unresolved.
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More than three weeks later, theransomware attack on Cloudstar, a cloud services provider for many title and settlement companies, is still unresolved. The company's services are still down, and Cloudstar doesn't know when they will be back online. The company said following the breach that it is negotiating with the attackers.
Cloudstar operates six data centers in the U.S. and has more than 42,000 users.
Unfortunately, several title companies that used Cloudstar have gone out of business since the outage, sources say.
The number ofransomware attacks — where cybercriminals lock up a company's data and demand payment to release it —exploded this year, and notably saw asurge during and since the Fourth of July weekend.
Title companies present a tempting target for ransomware, since they sit at such a critical juncture of the mortgage process, but lack the tech security of major lenders.
As John-Thomas Gaietto, executive director of cyber advisory services at financial services firm Richey May & Co, told Senior Mortgage Reporter Georgia Kromrei about the Cloudstar attack: "When we sit down and talk to leaders in the mortgage industry, the biggest area of concern is the title companies. Some of them are still using personal web mail from hotmail."
Not sure how your company would fare under such an attack? The federal government just updated its free Cyber Security Evaluation Tool to include a new module: the Ransomware Readiness Assessment. After completing the assessment, your business will receive reports that present a result summary, and you can filter content based on the granularity you need. Find out more here.
Title firm Fidelity National reported $3.9 billion in total revenue for the second quarter, up from $2.4 billion year over year and $2 billion in the first quarter.
With the increasing "need-for-speed" at which the lending community moves, keeping up is a constant task that never gets any easier. And as the refi-crunch subsides and homebuyers are increasingly competing against faster all-cash offers, speed once again is center stage.Presented by DataTrace
When you hear people say that the current housing market is like 2008 all over again, you may want to remind them of the huge differences between this market and that one. HW+ Premium Content
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