158-year-old company collapses after a hacking attack, 700 people lost their jobs

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A single cyber-attack can be devastating for companies with longstanding market presence, as was the case with a century-old transport company in Northamptonshire, UK, known as Knights of Old. This unfortunate event resulted in 700 people losing their jobs. The hackers managed to restrict access to their servers and destroyed crucial data. Simultaneously, they presented an exorbitant ransom that the company was unable to pay (as reported by Tom’s Hardware).

Weak password brought the company down

As per the BBC report, the root cause of the issues appears to be an unidentified worker who used a password that was too simple, making it easy for hackers to guess correctly without needing to resort to phishing or other data extraction tactics. Subsequently, these attackers encrypted the Knights of Old database and demanded ransom money to lift the encryption.

In addition to encoding the data, the cyber attackers not only erased all the backup files but also penetrated the endpoints, causing a significant breach. Unfortunately, our crisis management team’s assessment was grim when they arrived on the scene, and the insurer deemed it the most catastrophic scenario possible.

In my enthusiasm as a fan, I’d put it like this: “Back in the day, the Knights of Old reached out to the tech wizards, seeking a figure for their ransom. To my dismay, I discovered that they were asking for an astounding 5 million pounds, which is equivalent to over 6 million dollars! Unfortunately, our company didn’t have such funds at hand. This unfortunate turn of events led to bankruptcy, resulting in the loss of jobs for around 700 people and leaving 500 cars gathering dust instead of cruising on the roads.

This occurrence underscores the necessity of safeguarding your accounts, even business ones. A single oversight can provide unauthorized access to internal systems for cybercriminals eagerly seeking such chances. The Knights of Old case is noteworthy because, as per BBC’s report, similar breaches at other corporations take place frequently, but hackers rarely manage to gain entry by simply guessing the password correctly.

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2025-07-23 19:03