Biman Server Hacking: No ransom demanded

State Minister for Civil Aviation M Mahbub Ali yesterday claimed that hackers didn't demand any ransom for restoring Biman Bangladesh Airline's access to its server.

There was also not much damage caused to the national flag carrier due to the hacking, he said while talking to reporters after launching a memorial book titled "Mujib's Bangladesh" at a city hotel.

Shafiul Azim, managing director and CEO of Biman, who was beside the state minister at the event, claimed that they do not have any information regarding any ransom demand.

Biman and aviation insiders furnished The Daily Star with documents stating that hackers were demanding $5 million in ransom for restoring Biman's access to its server.

The email server of the airline was hacked on March 18.

According to Biman sources, on March 21, the hackers said they had more than 100GB data of the airline. Apart from this, they have downloaded data from many databases from the internal network of Biman.

If Biman did not accept their demand, they would publish the data on their blog.

On March 22, the hackers sent another message to Biman, saying, "You say in the media that no information has been leaked. But you are wrong."

The hackers also told Biman that flight information, passport information of passengers and employees and several other information have been stolen.

Biman in a press release the next day said their email server was infected with ransomware.

On Friday, hackers said the national carrier has approximately four days to comply with the ransom demand or else they would make public about 100GB of data, which include passport details of passengers, employees, and reports on other carriers, according to Biman sources. 

The data also included flight, cargo, and crew information of all flights, the hackers claimed.

Asked about the reported demand about ransom yesterday, Mahbub Ali said the information that hackers have demanded ransom was not correct.

"We do not have any such information. Biman has issued a press release in this regard," he also said.

"The hackers could not enter through the firewall. Because of this, they could not cause much damage. They could not steal any information. Everything that needs to be done in case of a cyberattack has been done by Biman. A general diary has been lodged and all measures have been taken."

Asked why Biman could not recover its email server from the hackers even after 9 days, the Biman MD said, "There was no disruption in the operations of Biman. Our activities are going on as usual. There was no problem. We hope to be able to give a complete picture of the incident tomorrow.

"A team of experts is working. We will be able to know about the hacking when the work will be done. However, there was no major damage to the airline."

He also said, "No such warning was given in advance regarding the possibility that the airline might be a victim of a cyberattack."

Asked if the hackers caused this incident due to negligence in the security system of Biman, he replied, "If we have any deficiencies, we will bring this forward. Biman will also work on how to prevent such incidents in the future."