German radio station forced to broadcast 'emergency tape' following cyberattack

Radio Geretsried, a local station in Germany, has blamed “unknown attackers from Russia” after an apparent ransomware incident left it broadcasting music from emergency backups.

The attack is the latest incident to disrupt a German organization, with the country’s Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) warning: “The extortion of companies and public institutions through ransomware is the fastest growing area of cybercrime and is now a major problem.”

According to a statement on Radio Geretsried’s website, the cyberattack took place on Sunday night with the hackers encrypting “all music files and are demanding a large ransom from the station.”

Based in the town of Geretsried in Bavaria, the volunteer radio station said its management board and a local volunteer group were working hard on a solution. As of Monday afternoon, local time, it was streaming music from what it called “emergency tape.”

“Our music editors are exporting music lists and everything that can still be saved. We will then have to reinstall all of our systems,” the station said.

It warned that the disruption was likely to continue until the middle of the week.

Ransomware attacks are continuing across much of the Western world, with law enforcement officials believing that many of the largest schemes have a significant Russian nexus.

Attacks are largely opportunistic, impacting organizations regardless of sector, and have repeatedly hit radio stations. Earlier this year, the San Francisco public broadcaster KQED complained it had been set back 20 years in technological terms by an attack.

Germany has particularly faced a surge in ransomware attacks over the past two years, with a database company, multiple universities and a hospital operator recently confirming disruptions.

The BSI says it “rates ransomware as one of the greatest operational threats to cyber security,” and warns the “quality of attacks is constantly increasing.”