Disclosure context

About Royal

Royal is a financially motivated ransomware group that emerged in November 2022, quickly establishing itself as a significant threat with over 200 documented victims across multiple sectors. The group is believed to operate independently rather than as a ransomware-as-a-service model, though their exact country of origin remains unclear based on publicly available intelligence. Royal primarily gains initial access through phishing campaigns and exploitation of remote desktop protocols, subsequently deploying custom ransomware that encrypts victim files while exfiltrating sensitive data for double extortion tactics. The group has demonstrated a preference for targeting critical infrastructure and public services, with notable attacks against educational institutions, healthcare facilities, and government entities primarily in the United States, though they have also significantly impacted organizations across Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, and France. Their encryption methodology involves custom-built malware that systematically encrypts files while maintaining persistence on compromised networks. As of recent reporting from federal agencies including CISA and FBI advisories, Royal remains an active threat with ongoing campaigns targeting organizations across their preferred sectors, particularly focusing on entities with limited cybersecurity resources that may be more likely to pay ransom demands. The group has been linked to 211 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on November 4, 2022; most recent post July 19, 2023. The operation is currently inactive.

Timeline of this disclosure

May 2, 2023Great Falls College of Technology listed by Royalon the group's public leak site

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Education sector, which has 694 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, Great Falls College of Technology 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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Great Falls College Montana State University

listed as Great Falls College of Technology · Claimed by Royal · listed 3 years ago

37m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

Listed
May 2, 2023
Data leaked

At a glance

Group: Royal
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Sector: Education
Listed on leak site: May 2, 2023

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

Great Falls College Montana State University is a public community college located in Great Falls, Montana, affiliated with the Montana State University System. It offers 20+ degree and certificate programs, continuing education and workforce training, with an average class size of 13 and a 17:1 student-to-faculty ratio. The college emphasizes affordability, flexible learning formats, and transfer pathways to four-year institutions within the Montana University System.

Industry: Public Community College Education
Address: Great Falls, Montana, United States

Attack summary

Severity: high — Data has been published (not merely threatened) and the group explicitly claims exfiltration of student PII and management data from a public educational institution, constituting confirmed exfiltration of regulated data (FERPA-protected student records) at a community college scale.

The Royal ransomware group claims to have exfiltrated internal data from Great Falls College MSU, describing it as containing detailed information on college operations, student records, and management data, with the college's affiliation to a larger university system noted as adding broader value to the stolen information. The disclosure status is listed as data_published, indicating the data has been released.

high

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Student records
Management data
Internal operational information

What the group claims

Great Falls College Montana State University is a public community college in Great Falls, Montana. It is affiliated with the Montana State University System. Internal information of this college is interested as a detailed description of inner operations with lost of students and management's data and as a part of a bigger institution with obvious greater quantity of information. Not much but sweet!

Sources

Victim sitegfcmsu.edu
Leak posthttp://royal4ezp7xrbakkus3oofjw6gszrohpodmdnfbe5e4w3og5sm7vb3qd.onion/p6E0cBDZNnCEGGWNyw6GyQYACY30OQhf

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.