Content, MSSP, Phishing

Ernst & Young Investigates $800,000 Cape Cod Community College Hack

Ernst & Young, which has a Top 100 MSSP business unit, and the state of Massachusetts' comptroller’s office are inspecting Cape Cod Community College's network to ensure malware is completely removed from the system, according to a local newspaper report.

The cleanup comes after hackers launched a phishing attack against Cape Cod Community College, and stole more than $800,000 from the school's financial accounts at TD Bank. The college's president, John L. Cox, says there's a high probability that most or all of the funds will be recovered since the transactions involved onshore accounts, according to the newspaper report.

The college also is installing AppGuard, an endpoint security software platform. Effective security software apparently was installed only on selected machines at the time of the attack. A complete install across all college systems would have prevented the phishing attack and associated financial loss, Cox suggested in a separate statement in recent days.

Ernst & Young, better known as EY these days, is an accounting firm as well as a Top 100 MSSP. The company, which is beginning a CEO transition, has 270,000 employees in over 150 countries.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.