The firm ordinarily posts messages about new sponsorship details with local and professional sporting teams and clubs including Newcastle Jets and, most recently, the North Tamworth Bears.
But on Thursday, Hagipantelis posted a far darker message to its website as it alerted clients to the breach.
“We are taking this breach very seriously and have reported the incident to the Australian Cyber Security Centre and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner,” Hagipantelis wrote.
“Once our investigations are complete, we will work with the relevant parties to ensure that all appropriate steps are taken and will notify individuals as required to provide guidance and support.”
“We can confirm that security of our IT system has been restored.”
As legal offices are entrusted with reams of highly sensitive, highly confidential documents, Brydens is not the first firm to suffer what is known as a “ransomware” attack as legal offices.
Just one month earlier, in mid-January, staff of New Zealand firm Bell and Graham returned from their Christmas break to find their server had been breached.
“Since being informed of the compromise, we have been working hard to understand the scope of what has happened and identify those impacted. We appreciate your patience as we work through this situation which has been a stressful one for our team,” the firm’s statement says on their website.
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Two years ago, a Russian-linked group calling itself ALPHV/BlackCat claimed to have “exfiltrated data” from HWL Ebsworth, another large Australian firm.
The hackers took about four terabytes of data, seven times the size of the Brydens breach, and dragged in more than 60 government departments who had used the firm for work on tenders.
The NSW Supreme Court issued an injunction to prevent people from accessing the stolen files.
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