Hackers holding website access for ransom

HOUSTON (FOX 26) - While hackers have stolen the personal information of hundreds of millions of people, in recent years, the details of their crime is rarely part of the headlines.

A Houston web-developer saw it all, first hand, when nearly a dozen client-websites were hijacked by Pakistani hackers.

"They left a note, saying 'If you want your site back, you need to pay 2-thousand dollars, via Western Union'," says Juan Guevara Torres, of NowMedia Digital.

Guevara Torres was able to trace the hackers' digital trail and plug the leak while pretending to negotiate with the hackers.

In one, recorded, conversation, the hacker was insistent the money be paid.

"I tell you a simple solution. If you want the site up in a few hours, or something like that, I'm only telling you the solutions," he said.

The particulars of 'how' the sites were hijacked are a little complicated.

Guevara Torres says, in the end, it came down to the hackers gaining access to the sites' inner-workings, by 'pretending' to be someone they weren't.

"Usually, the weakest link is a human who clicks something, downloads something, goes to a site, whatever," he says.

Guevara Torres warns that hackers will keep hacking and the only real protection is being very careful who has access to our information.