Disclosure context

About Karakurt

Karakurt is a ransomware group that emerged in December 2022, operating primarily as a data extortion threat actor with financial motivations rather than traditional file encryption. The group's origin and affiliations remain largely undocumented by major cybersecurity agencies, though their operational patterns suggest they function as an independent entity rather than a confirmed ransomware-as-a-service operation. Karakurt employs data theft and extortion tactics, focusing on exfiltrating sensitive information from victim networks before demanding payment under threat of public disclosure, representing a pure extortion model that bypasses traditional encryption-based ransomware approaches. The group has targeted 74 known victims across multiple sectors, with particular focus on healthcare, education, manufacturing, energy, and professional services organizations, primarily affecting entities in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Singapore, and India. Based on available reporting from established cybersecurity agencies and researchers, Karakurt appears to remain active as of recent assessments, though comprehensive intelligence on their specific attack vectors, tools, and major campaigns remains limited in publicly documented sources from CISA, FBI, and major security research organizations. The group has been linked to 74 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on December 11, 2022; most recent post September 22, 2023. The operation is currently inactive.

Timeline of this disclosure

September 22, 2023Hospice of Huntington listed by Karakurton the group's public leak site

Data size: 20 GB

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Healthcare sector, which has 1,779 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, Hospice of Huntington is reported in United States, a country with 7,392 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

How we know this. Darkfield monitors public ransomware leak sites continuously, archiving every new disclosure and the data later released against the victim. Each entry on this page is sourced from the operator's own publication and cross-checked against complementary OSINT feeds (RansomLook, ransomware.live, RansomWatch). We do not collect or host stolen data — only the metadata, timestamps and screenshots needed to make the public disclosure searchable and accountable. Records here are corrected when the original post is edited, retracted, or merged with another disclosure.

Ransomware victim disclosure

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Hospice of Huntington

Claimed by Karakurt · listed 3 years ago

20 GB

Data size

32m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

Listed
Sep 22, 2023
Data leaked

At a glance

Group: Karakurt
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Sector: Healthcare
Listed on leak site: Sep 22, 2023
Data size: 20 GB

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

Hospice of Huntington, Inc. is the first hospice in West Virginia, founded in 1982 and headquartered in Huntington, WV. The organization provides end-of-life and palliative care to tens of thousands of patients in the tri-state area (West Virginia and Southern Ohio), serving Cabell, Lincoln, Mason, Wayne, Lawrence, Meigs, and Gallia counties. It also operates the Emogene Dolin Jones Hospice House and offers grief support, pediatric hospice care, and related services.

Industry: Hospice & End-of-Life Care
Address: 1101 Sixth Avenue, Huntington, WV 25701
Founded: 1982

Attack summary

Severity: critical — The breach involves confirmed exfiltration of medical records and PII at a healthcare organization, constituting regulated health data (HIPAA-covered) alongside financial, HR, and donor information — meeting the threshold for critical severity.

Karakurt claims to have exfiltrated 20 GB of data from Hospice of Huntington without stating encryption, including financial and operational files, HR information, medical records, personally identifiable information of volunteers, and donation records.

critical

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Financial records
Operational files
HR information
Medical records
Volunteer personally identifiable information
Donation records

What the group claims

Hospice of Huntington, Inc. is the first hospice in the State of West Virginia. Founded in 1982. Karakurt has obtained 20 gb data of the hospice. Many financial and operating files. HR information, medical records, PI of volunteers, information of donations and much other.

Sources

Victim sitehospiceofhuntington.org

Source

Indexed 3 years ago

This page surfaces a public ransomware disclosure indexed by Darkfield. Original posts come from the operator's own leak site; we cross-check against ransomware.live, RansomLook and RansomWatch where applicable. Share this URL freely.