Was hanover-ma.gov hit by ransomware?

hanover-ma.gov was listed by the lockbit5 ransomware operation (United States), and stolen data was published on the group's leak site. Darkfield tracks this disclosure with the original leak post, screenshot and group context.

Who is the lockbit5 ransomware group?

lockbit5 is a ransomware operator tracked by Darkfield. See the full operator dossier for its known victims, sectors targeted, IOCs and leak-site infrastructure.

What data was leaked in the hanover-ma.gov breach?

lockbit5 published data attributed to hanover-ma.gov. Darkfield captured the leak post and a screenshot of the listing.

Ransomware victim disclosure

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Town of Hanover, Massachusetts

listed as hanover-ma.gov · Claimed by Lockbit5 · listed 4 months ago

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

ListedFeb 14, 2026
Data leakeddate unknown

At a glance

Group: Lockbit5
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Sector: Public Sector
Listed on leak site: Feb 14, 2026

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

The Town of Hanover is a municipal government entity located in Hanover, Massachusetts. It operates various public services including the Hanover Police Department, which is referenced in the leak post. As a local government body, it serves the residents of Hanover, MA with law enforcement, administrative, and community services.

Industry: Municipal Government & Public Safety
Address: 550 Rockland Street, Hanover, MA 02339, United States
Employees: 51-200

Attack summary

Severity: critical — The victim is a municipal government entity with law enforcement operations; data_published status confirms exfiltration of what is likely sensitive government and PII data, potentially including law enforcement records, which are regulated and sensitive in nature.

LockBit 5 claims to have attacked the Town of Hanover, Massachusetts, with the leak post specifically calling out the Hanover Police Department; the disclosed status indicates data has been published, suggesting exfiltration of government and potentially law-enforcement-related data.

critical

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Police department records
Government administrative files
Potentially personally identifiable information of residents
Law enforcement operational data

What the group claims

The mission of the Hanover Police Department is to prevent crime, but instead of doing their job, th...

Sources

Source

Indexed 4 months 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.

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Disclosure context

About lockbit5

Based on the provided data, LockBit5 appears to be a recently emerged ransomware operation first observed in December 2025, representing what may be a new iteration or rebrand within the LockBit ransomware ecosystem, with primary financial motivations evidenced by their targeting of high-value sectors. Given the LockBit naming convention and the timing of emergence, this group likely operates from Eastern Europe or Russia and may represent either a continuation of previous LockBit operations or a new affiliate group leveraging the established LockBit brand, though specific organizational details remain undocumented by major security agencies. While detailed attack methodologies have not been publicly documented by CISA, FBI, or major security researchers, the group's targeting pattern across 157 victims suggests a broad-spectrum approach focusing on technology, manufacturing, healthcare, and transportation sectors primarily in the United States, Brazil, Germany, Italy, and Mexico. Due to the group's recent emergence in December 2025, there are no publicly documented notable campaigns or major incidents reported by established threat intelligence sources, though the victim count indicates active operations. The group appears to be currently active based on the recent first observation date, though comprehensive analysis from major security agencies has not yet been published given the short timeframe since emergence. The group has been linked to 278 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on December 7, 2025; most recent post June 11, 2026. The operation is currently active.

Timeline of this disclosure

February 14, 2026hanover-ma.gov listed by lockbit5on the group's public leak site

Other recent disclosures by lockbit5

lockbit5 has been linked to 278 public victims on Darkfield. A sample of the most recent:

See the full lockbit5 dossier →

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Public Sector sector, which has 260 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, hanover-ma.gov is reported in United States, a country with 7,392 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

If your organisation is affected

A listing by lockbit5 means hanover-ma.gov appeared on a ransomware extortion site and data attributed to it has been published. If this is your organisation, or a supplier you depend on, the priority is to confirm the intrusion and contain it before the window to act closes.

Engage your incident-response team and preserve forensic evidence before remediating — do not wipe affected systems first.
Force a password reset and revoke active sessions for exposed accounts; rotate any credentials, API keys or certificates that may have been in the stolen data.
Assess regulatory notification duties (GDPR, NIS2, sector regulators) — many carry a 72-hour reporting clock from awareness.
Monitor for the data appearing on lockbit5's leak site and across paste and breach channels, and brief downstream partners who may be exposed through you.

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.