A large wave of hoax emails with bomb threats, except if recipients pay $20.000 in Bitcoins, causes mass shutdown of hospitals, schools, organizations, and businesses in US and Canada
The hoax emails started appearing yesterday, Thursday morning, and v base they warn that explosives have been planted in the recipient's premises and that they will detonate by the end of the day unless the recipient pays $20.000 in bitcoins. By late Thursday afternoon, more than 100.000 such emails were reported to have been received. A large percentage of the emails used different email addresses, e-wallets, sender's name and the type of explosive materials. That is, somebody or somebody didn't just send a tsunami of identical scam emails, but they changed the handwritten ones depending on the recipient.
A sample of these emails is the following:
I am writing to inform you that my husband has hidden the bomb (tronitrotoluene) in the building where your company is located. My mercenary built a bomb according to my instructions. It is compact and it is hidden very carefully, it is impossible to destroy the structure of the building by my bomb, but in the case of its detonation there will be many wounded people.
My mercenary is controlling the situation around the building. If he sees any strange activity or cops he will blow up the device.
I can call off my mercenary if you make a transfer. You pay me 20'000 usd in Bitcoin and explosive will not detonate, but do not try to fool me - I assure you that I have to call off my recruited person only after 3 confirmations in blockchain.
The particulars of the email caused quite a stir problems and closing several facilities in the US and Canada, including:
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco Municipal Railroad bus disruptions and evacuations of the Jewish Community Center and the San Francisco Fire Department.
According to ABC 7, evacuations in many hospitals and businesses in Chicago.
Base of the Tampa Bay Times Closing buildings and schools in Tampa, Florida.
https://twitter.com/0x736A/status/1073302647829082112?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1073302647829082112&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Farstechnica.com%2Finformation-technology%2F2018%2F12%2Fa-tsunami-of-emailed-bomb-hoaxes-prompts-evacuations-across-the-us-and-canada%2F
All three of these reports are a small part of what was done in both countries. So far there are no reports of explosive materials. OR New York police report that threats are pranks.
It seems unlikely that he or those responsible for the wave of emails will wait to make money out of this trick. First of all, the average person will need one day or more, just to understand how to use the bitcoin. And even people who already have bitcoin are unlikely to make a 20.000 dollar payment without first calling the police.
Since the perpetrators have tried to change the text to thousands of emails each time depending on the recipient, the most likely motivation is to want to create disturbances to the greatest possible extent, or at least to experiment with such massive disturbances. On the other hand, a bomb threat, as ridiculous as it may seem, for the US and Canada, is always taken seriously.
