Emergency Communications Network Breach Incident Score: Analysis & Impact (EME0664306112525)

In this Rankiteo incident briefing, we review the Emergency Communications Network breach identified under incident ID EME0664306112525.

The analysis begins with a detailed overview of Emergency Communications Network's information like the linkedin page: https://www.linkedin.com/company/emergency-communications-network-llc, the number of followers: 1019, the industry type: IT Services and IT Consulting and the number of employees: 56 employees

After the initial compromise, the video explains how Rankiteo's incident engine converts technical details into a normalized incident score. The incident score before the incident was 100 and after the incident was 100 with a difference of 0 which is could be a good indicator of the severity and impact of the incident.

In the next step of the video, we will analyze in more details the incident and the impact it had on Emergency Communications Network and their customers.

Douglas County Sheriff's Office (DCSO) recently reported "Cyber Attack on CodeRED Emergency Alert System Disrupts Services Across Colorado and Nationwide", a noteworthy cybersecurity incident.

CodeRED, an emergency alert system owned by Crisis24 (OnSolve), suffered a cyber attack in early [Month, Year not specified].

The disruption is felt across the environment, affecting CodeRED emergency alert platform (legacy OnSolve environment), and exposing Names, Addresses and Email addresses.

In response, teams activated the incident response plan, moved swiftly to contain the threat with measures like Decommissioning of legacy OnSolve CodeRED platform and Isolation of affected environment, and began remediation that includes Accelerated rollout of 'CodeRED by Crisis24' platform, and stakeholders are being briefed through Limited (criticized by agencies for lack of transparency), Public statement via media (Denver7) and Advisories to users about password reuse risks.

The case underscores how Ongoing (forensic analysis mentioned; no final report cited), teams are taking away lessons such as Proactive communication with stakeholders during incidents is critical to maintain trust, Legacy systems may pose higher risks and require accelerated replacement and Password reuse by users amplifies breach impacts; education on password hygiene is essential, and recommending next steps like Implement real-time monitoring and alerting for system outages, Establish clear protocols for notifying affected parties during breaches and Conduct regular security audits of emergency notification platforms, with advisories going out to stakeholders covering Users advised to change passwords if reused elsewhere and Agencies advised to transition to alternative platforms (e.g., RAVE, IPAWS).

Finally, we try to match the incident with the MITRE ATT&CK framework to see if there is any correlation between the incident and the MITRE ATT&CK framework.

The MITRE ATT&CK framework is a knowledge base of techniques and sub-techniques that are used to describe the tactics and procedures of cyber adversaries. It is a powerful tool for understanding the threat landscape and for developing effective defense strategies.

Rankiteo's analysis has identified several MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques associated with this incident, each with varying levels of confidence based on available evidence. Under the Initial Access tactic, the analysis identified Valid Accounts (T1078) with moderate to high confidence (70%), supported by evidence indicating legacy CodeRED environment compromised; no explicit vector, but likely abused existing accounts/credentials and Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) with moderate to high confidence (80%), supported by evidence indicating vulnerabilities in legacy OnSolve CodeRED platform exploited to gain access. Under the Credential Access tactic, the analysis identified Credentials from Password Stores (T1555) with high confidence (95%), supported by evidence indicating names, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers, and **passwords** exposed and OS Credential Dumping (T1003) with moderate confidence (60%), supported by evidence indicating legacy system compromise may have involved dumping stored credentials (implied by passwords exposure). Under the Collection tactic, the analysis identified Data from Local System (T1005) with high confidence (95%), supported by evidence indicating data published online including PII (names, addresses, emails, phone numbers). Under the Exfiltration tactic, the analysis identified Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol (T1048) with moderate to high confidence (80%), supported by evidence indicating data published online by an organized cybercriminal group (method unspecified) and Automated Exfiltration (T1020) with moderate to high confidence (70%), supported by evidence indicating large-scale data breach (88K landline + 130K cell users) suggests automated collection/exfiltration. Under the Impact tactic, the analysis identified Endpoint Denial of Service: Application or System Exploitation (T1499.004) with high confidence (90%), supported by evidence indicating disabled the entire CodeRED system nationwide via legacy platform compromise, Data Destruction (T1485) with moderate confidence (50%), supported by evidence indicating system outage implied potential corruption/deletion, though not explicitly confirmed, and Network Denial of Service: Disruption of Emergency Services (T1498.002) with high confidence (95%), supported by evidence indicating preventing critical emergency alerts (e.g., wildfires, active shooters) from being sent. Under the Defense Evasion tactic, the analysis identified Indicator Removal: File Deletion (T1070.004) with moderate confidence (60%), supported by evidence indicating legacy system decommissioned post-breach; possible attacker cleanup (speculative) and Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools (T1562.001) with moderate to high confidence (70%), supported by evidence indicating delayed detection/response to the attack suggests possible defense impairment. Under the Persistence tactic, the analysis identified Account Manipulation (T1098) with moderate to high confidence (70%), supported by evidence indicating legacy system compromise may have involved creating/maintaining backdoor accounts (implied by prolonged outage). Under the Lateral Movement tactic, the analysis identified Remote Services: Web Services (T1021.006) with moderate confidence (60%), supported by evidence indicating attack contained to the legacy CodeRED environment but caused nationwide outage (possible internal pivoting). These correlations help security teams understand the attack chain and develop appropriate defensive measures based on the observed tactics and techniques.