Was West Chester hit by ransomware?

West Chester was listed by the pear 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 pear ransomware group?

pear 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 West Chester breach?

pear published data attributed to West Chester. Darkfield captured the leak post and a screenshot of the listing.

Ransomware victim disclosure

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West Chester Township

listed as West Chester · Claimed by Pear · listed 10 months ago

10m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

ListedSep 14, 2025
Data leakeddate unknown

At a glance

Group: Pear
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Listed on leak site: Sep 14, 2025

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

West Chester Township is a charter township located in Butler County, Ohio, and is the most populous township in the state with a population of 65,242 per the 2020 census. It provides municipal services including administration, public safety, parks, and community development to residents in the greater Cincinnati metropolitan area. The township is governed by an elected Board of Trustees and operates through a professional administrative staff.

Industry: Local Government / Municipal Township Administration
Address: 9113 Cincinnati-Dayton Rd, West Chester Township, OH 45069, United States
Employees: 51-200

Attack summary

Severity: high — The victim is a local government entity serving over 65,000 residents; data_published status confirms exfiltration has occurred, likely including citizen PII, personnel records, and sensitive municipal data, which elevates severity to high. Critical would require confirmed regulated data (e.g., medical or financial records at scale) explicitly evidenced.

The ransomware group 'pear' claims to have attacked West Chester Township and has published data (disclosed status: data_published), suggesting exfiltration of township records; no ransom amount or specific data volume was stated in the post.

high

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Township administrative records
Resident/citizen PII
Government personnel records
Public safety records
Financial/budget documents

What the group claims

West Chester Township is the most populous township in Ohio, with a population of 65,242 according to the 2020 census

Sources

Victim sitewestchesteroh.org
Leak posthttp://pearsmob5sn44ismokiusuld34pnfwi6ctgin3qbvonpoob4lh3rmtqd.onion/Companies/westchesteroh

Source

Indexed 10 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 pear

The Pear ransomware group is a relatively new threat actor that emerged in August 2025, operating with primarily financial motivations and targeting victims across multiple countries and sectors. Based on their recent emergence and limited public documentation, specific details about their country of origin and organizational structure remain unclear, though their targeting patterns suggest a financially-driven operation that may operate independently or as part of a smaller ransomware-as-a-service model. With 65 documented victims since their August 2025 debut, the group has demonstrated a preference for targeting organizations in the United States, New Zealand, Australia, Egypt, and Switzerland, with particular focus on healthcare, business services, manufacturing, and technology sectors. Their attack methodology and specific technical details have not been extensively documented by major threat intelligence firms or law enforcement agencies, though their rapid victim acquisition suggests they have established effective initial access and encryption capabilities. Notable campaigns and high-profile attacks have not been publicly detailed by CISA, FBI, or major security research organizations, likely due to the group's recent emergence and relatively small scale compared to established ransomware operations. As of late 2025, Pear appears to remain active given their recent emergence and ongoing victim targeting across multiple geographic regions and industry verticals. The group has been linked to 103 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on August 5, 2025; most recent post July 13, 2026. The operation is currently active.

Timeline of this disclosure

September 14, 2025West Chester listed by pearon the group's public leak site

Other recent disclosures by pear

pear has been linked to 103 public victims on Darkfield. A sample of the most recent:

See the full pear dossier →

Sector and geography

Geographically, West Chester is reported in United States, a country with 11,033 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

If your organisation is affected

A listing by pear means West Chester 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.
Report the incident to your national CERT, CISA (United States), as required for your jurisdiction.
Monitor for the data appearing on pear'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.