MGM Resorts, the company that operates many of the most popular casinos in Las Vegas, suffered a cyberattack that forced the company to take many services offline. The attack appears to have occurred last Sunday, coinciding with the start of the NFL season and a time when Las Vegas sports betting season ramps up.
Slot machines on the casino floor were shut down, guest room keys stopped working, and the MGM Resorts website was down while the company recovered from the attack. Guests waited in long lines to get physical room keys, and the casino used handwritten receipts to vouch for winnings on the floor as they decided to stay open through the recovery response.
The cyberattack highlights how even a large corporation that prioritizes cybersecurity is still vulnerable to targeted attack vectors. People are usually the most susceptible factor in large corporations that use enterprise-level security. End users appear to be the failure point from the early reportings of this breach.
The group attributed with the attack has been active since 2021, but they are broadening their attack vectors and recently added ransomware to their skill arsenal. In previous attacks, this group used a two-step process to gain entry into business networks. First, they used a phishing campaign against employees to obtain personally identifiable information (PII), employee IDs, and usernames. Next, they used this information to call the company help desk to ask for a password reset. If challenged, the hacker group could talk their way through the company help desk with excuses on why they need the reset. Previous reports point out that the group consists of native English speakers, which allowed them to convince IT employees to reset passwords.
This recent attack is a reminder that even enterprise-level security still relies on people and the training they receive.
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