Data Backup Digest

It seems that nothing is safe from today's computer hacker, including that of the medical marijuana industry. MJ Freeway, a popular platform that is used to track medical cannabis inventory and sales across the country, is just one of the latest targets of modern cyber criminals.

According to representatives with MJ Freeway, no sensitive information was obtained in the hack. This information was encrypted, so it wouldn't have been accessible even if the data was compromised. In fact, the entire attack was rather limited in nature. As it only brought down the main servers and backup systems of MJ Freeway, the only significant result was the downtime and data loss experienced by users of the popular tracking and database software.

Jeanette Ward, executive director of director and marketing with MJ Freeway, stated in a recent interview: "It was a cyber-attack, and it was targeted at us specifically. We are going full-force with a forensic investigation, and we’ll turn over the results to criminal investigators as needed."

When asked how they're handling public relations, Ward said: "We have spoken to many clients directly. We’ve got our support lines open. We’ve also reached out to (some larger) clients proactively. We’re sending emails to all clients every couple of hours to update them."

Unfortunately for users of MJ Freeway, this isn't the first that the system has suffered from IT issues. Technical difficulties in 2014 resulted in a downtime that lasted over 24 hours, which ultimately cost business owners thousands of dollars in lost profits. Although the incident in 2014 was accredited to a glitch in the cloud-based system of MJ Freeway and not a hack, the impact was enough to cause some of their customers to look elsewhere.

Complicating matters even more is the fact that MJ Freeway has recently been touting a brand new version of its popular online platform. Representatives with the company are quick to point out that the hack only affected their current software and not the enhanced, upgraded version that will be rolled out within the coming weeks and months.

The recent situation amounted to little more than a few delays in scheduling and some complication in recordkeeping, but those within the medical marijuana industry aren't taking the attack lightly. Neither an individual hacker nor a group has been identified, but MJ Freeway is dedicated to pursuing the matter through the end.

Additionally, MJ Freeway has already made the transition to brand new infrastructure with much greater security. The company's CEO summed it up by saying: "Keeping our client's data secure has always been our top priority."

Per their website, MJ Freeway is "the industry-leading software solution for marijuana businesses, with clients in 23 states, the District of Columbia, Canada, and Europe." They were initially founded in 2010 and have remained a major player in the medical marijuana industry ever since. For more information on MJ Freeway, which remains one of the most popular business and compliance solutions in the medical marijuana industry, please visit their official website at www.mjfreeway.com.