Cyberattack hits Oil India; gets ₹57 cr ransom demand in bitcoin to restore access

A ransomware cyberattack occurred at the headquarters of PSU major Oil India Limited (OIL) in Assam. The OIL received a ransom demand of $75,00,000 (over ₹57 crore) in bitcoin to restore access to its computers.

The public sector undertaking OIL and the government exchequer have incurred a huge financial loss due to the cyberattack - ransomware, as the business through the IT system has been seriously affected, OIL Manager (Security) Sachin Kumar said in the police complaint.

However, the drilling and production work has been unaffected, the OIL spokesperson said.

The cyberattack took place on April 10 at OIL's one of the workstations of the Geological and Reservoir department, but it was intimated by the IT department on Tuesday, he said.

"After their preliminary investigation, it came to their notice that OIL's network, server, and clients' PCs are facing network outage.

The data of OIL are being saved offline now and they will be uploaded later when the IT system will run again.