Major cloud, email hosting provider blames ransomware attack for outage

Email hosting provider Rackspace Technology confirmed on Tuesday that a ransomware attack is behind an outage that has been disrupting its email service since Friday. 

The company said it has retained a cyber defense firm to investigate the attack and has since discovered that the incident only impacted its Hosted Exchange business while its other products and services are fully operational.

Following the discovery of the ransomware attack, Rackspace said it took measures to contain the incident from spreading to other services.

“Out of an abundance of caution, Rackspace Technology has put additional security measures in place and will continue to actively monitor for any suspicious activity,” Rackspace said. 

The company added that the incident continues to cause disruption and may result in a loss of revenue to its $30 million email service, as well as some “incremental costs” tied to responding to the incident.  

Rackspace did not provide details on who might be behind the attack, what they stole and how many customers have been impacted by the incident.