On 28 March, a cyber attack took place on the automatic meter reading system (AMR) of Haryana power utilities in Panchkula. According to the reports of New Indian Express, whoever was responsible for the hack also demanded Rs 1 crore in Bitcoin as a ransom from the state government to decrypt the files and restore access to the system.
According to some anonymous resources, UHBVN, which monitors electricity billing for nine districts in Haryana, was the target of a cyber attack at seventeen minutes past midnight on 21 March. Press Trust of India (PTI) confirmed about the attack on the 21st March that took place around midnight.
The message of the asked ransom was planned. It was displayed on computer screens of the head office of UHBVN in Panchkula, allegedly demanding Rs 1 crore in Bitcoin from the state government in exchange to restore access.
However, there was no loss of billing data as a backup was already available with the Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (UHBVN), an official told the PTI.
A case has been registered in Panchkula under a number of sections of the IT Act and the Indian Penal Code, however, not naming the sections.
An FIR into the incident has been lodged, officials informed PTI
The system that was hacked was installed, operated and managed by Tata Consultancy Services Ltd (TCS) since 2011.
After the attach, cyber experts as well as other IT experts were consulted to do a background check and detect loopholes in the the system. An official told,
“The database was found encrypted and the backup of encrypted database was also taken for further retrieval,”
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