600,000 routers were bricked in a single cyberattack
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
A cyberattack was behind an incident last year that disabled over 600,000 internet routers across several Midwest states between October 25th and 27th, according to new research published by Lumen Technologies’ threat research arm, Black Lotus Labs. The incident wasn’t disclosed at the time, despite hundreds of thousands of routers being rendered inoperable.
The investigation also didn’t specify which company was targeted, but Reuters says it has identified the target as Windstream, an Arkansas-based ISP, based on cross-referencing internet outages reported during the same period. Windstream, which has a service area covering many rural or underserved communities, declined The Verge’s request for comment.
Black Lotus Labs investigated...