A major U.S. payment gateway and solutions provider says a ransomware attack has knocked key systems offline, triggering a widespread outage affecting multiple services.
The incident began on Friday and quickly escalated into a nationwide disruption across BridgePay's platform.
Ransomware confirmed within hours of outage
BridgePay Network Solutions confirmed late Friday that the incident disrupting its payment gateway was caused by ransomware.
In an update posted Feb. 6, the company said it has engaged federal law enforcement, including the FBI and U.S. Secret Service, along with external forensic and recovery teams.
"Initial forensic findings indicate that no payment card data has been compromised," the company said, adding that any accessed files were encrypted and that there is currently "no evidence of usable data exposure."
BleepingComputer has contacted BridgePay with questions about the ransomware group involved, which BridgePay has not yet named.
Merchants report cash-only payments
Around the same time BridgePay disclosed the incident, some U.S. merchants and organizations began telling customers they could only accept cash due to a nationwide card-processing outage.
One restaurant said its "credit card processing company had a cyber security breach" and that card payments were unavailable nationwide.
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