Multiple CMG Stations Disrupted by Ransomware Attack

RADIO ONLINE | Friday, June 4, 2021

Cox Media Group

Cox Media Group was reportedly hit with a ransomware attack on Thursday morning affected several of its radio station streams. Several CMG station online streams went offline with the websites posting the message "audio temporarily unavailable." According to Saving Country Music, stations are still broadcasting, but some outlets were "unable to update programing or compose news or talk segments due to the cyber attack."

Some live programming had to be canceled, and most Cox radio station streams remained offline Friday morning, while News/Talk WSB-AM and WSBB-FM/Atlanta were able to resume live streaming on both its website and dedicated mobile app.

"This morning we were told to shut down everything and log out our emails to ensure nothing spread," a Cox employee shared in a private conversation with computer security site The Record. "According to my friends at affiliate stations, we shut things down in time to be safe and should be back up and running soon."

CMG employees were told to turn off station computers or laptops immediately and not to access their Cox email accounts, FTV Live reported, and they were told to delete tweets about the outages.