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The Cockrell Police Department has admitted that they have lost at least some of 8 years worth of evidence because they aren’t that bright. This happened after their server, which much of it, wasn’t backed up for whatever reason, was infected with ransomware.
Lost evidence includes all body camera video, some in-car video, some in-house surveillance video, some photographs, and all Microsoft Office documents.
“It is […] unknown how many videos or photographs that could have assisted newer cases will not be available, although the number of affected prosecutions should remain relatively small,” the Department said.
IT staff said they were infected with the OSIRIS ransomware, which doesn’t actually exist, showing the idiocy of the technicians involved. More than likely, they were victims of hackers using the Locky randsomware, which uses a .osiris extension on it’s encrypted files.
The department says the infection was discovered on December 12, last year, and the crooks asked for a $4,000 ransom fee to unlock the files. After consulting with the FBI’s cyber-crime unit, the department decided to wipe their data server and reinstall everything. In an absolutely brilliant move, much of the data could not be recovered from backups, as the backup procedure kicked in shortly after the ransomware took root, and backed up copies of the encrypted files.
