It was recently brought to the attention of Letaba Herald that businesses around Tzaneen have been falling victim to hackers.

It is alleged that company systems are hacked and a bitcoin ransom is demanded.

Herald spoke to one of the victims, Eugene van der Linde, who went through this and who stated that it wasn’t the first time that he experienced this.

Read: Beware of online shopping scams

“It first happened to me last year with one of my clients. And then it happened again about three months ago where they blocked us out of our files and sent an email with a demand for us to gain back access. Anyone knows that once you pay them off, they just come back for more so we did not do that,” stated Eugene.

He further advised that it is better for companies to have external back-ups, like saving on cloud and monitoring their software frequently. “It is unfortunate that some businesses have their routine back-ups scheduled at night, which means that if the hackers attack anytime from knock-off until before the backing up is done, the business will lose their day’s work,” exclaimed Eugene. The information was brought to Herald to raise awareness among local businesses to be cautious at all times.

If you have any information regarding scammers and hackers that you would like to share please send an email to: journo2@herald.co.za