Ransomware attack on Singapore’s HomeTeamNS crippled servers, compromised members’ data

Singaporean non-profit HomeTeamNS said it recently experienced a major ransomware incident that crippled some internal servers and compromised the sensitive personal information of its members.

 

Founded in 2005, HomeTeamNS is a non-profit organisation set up to recognise the invaluable contributions of the Singapore Police Force (SPF) and Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) personnel to the safety and security of the nation. It has a membership base of more than 260,000 National Service personnel, including current and former employees of Home Team agencies along with their family and friends.

 

In a statement posted on its website on Monday, HomeTeamNS said that it experienced a ransomware attack and immediately launched an investigation, with assistance from external cyber security experts, to determine the scope of the incident.

 

HomeTeamNS promptly took steps to contain the incident, including tking the affected servers offline and isolating them from the internal network. 

 

“The affected servers contained some data of our employees and ex-employees, and the vehicle details of some members and affiliate members. At this time, there is no evidence of data extraction, but we are monitoring closely,” the non-profit said.

 

The organisation said that it has contacted its members who were potentially affected by the incident and is assisting them with protecting themselves from phishing or unauthorised transactions, and to minimise the impact from this incident.

 

“As part of our remediation efforts, the passwords of all our administrative accounts have been changed, and security scans and firewalls have been further enhanced to strengthen our network security. 

 

“The protection of our stakeholders’ personal data is of utmost importance to HomeTeamNS. We are working closely with our cybersecurity experts, the police and the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore to investigate and remediate this incident,” it added.

 

At the time of publishing, no known hacker group has claimed responsibility for the cyber attack on HomeTeamNS. The organisation also did not share details on who was behind the ransomware attack or whether it has received a ransom demand.