Was holtcat.com hit by ransomware?

holtcat.com was listed by the Cactus 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 Cactus ransomware group?

Cactus 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 holtcat.com breach?

Cactus published data attributed to holtcat.com. Darkfield captured the leak post and a screenshot of the listing.

Ransomware victim disclosure

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holtcat.com

Claimed by Cactus · listed 1 year ago

$1B

Ransom

demanded

16m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

ListedFeb 26, 2025
Data leakeddate unknown

At a glance

Group: Cactus
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Sector: Manufacturing
Listed on leak site: Feb 26, 2025
Ransom demanded: $1B
Estimated revenue: $1B

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

HOLT CAT is an authorized Caterpillar heavy equipment and engine dealer headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. The company sells, services, and rents Cat equipment, engines, and generators for construction, mining, industrial, petroleum, and agricultural applications, with multiple locations across Texas and reported annual revenue of approximately $1 billion.

Industry: Heavy Equipment & Machinery Distribution
Address: 5665 SE Loop 410, San Antonio, Texas, 78222, United States

Attack summary

Severity: critical — Confirmed exfiltration of regulated sensitive data at scale including PII (I-9 documents, passports, driver's licenses, employee personal information), financial/payroll records, and corporate confidential engineering data from a large enterprise. Dark web publication with proof files demonstrates operational capability and intent to disclose.

Cactus claims to have exfiltrated personal identifiable information, database backups, corporate confidential data, financial and payroll documents, HR records, engineering documentation, customer information, and executive private data from HOLT CAT. The group has published proof files and screenshots on dark web mirrors.

critical

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Personal identifiable information
Database backups
Financial and payroll documents
HR department records
Engineering documentation and drawings
Customer information
Employee and executive private data
Corporate correspondence and contracts
Confidential business agreements

The group's post references roughly 5 proof files.

What the group claims

Automobile Dealers. “HOLT CAT is the authorized Caterpillar heavy equipment and engine dealer, headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. HOLT sells, services and rents Cat equipment, engines and generators for construction, mining, industrial, petroleum and agricultural applications.” Website: <a href="https://www.holtcat.com/">https://www.holtcat.com/</a> Revenue : $1B Address: 5665 SE Loop 410, San Antonio, Texas, 78222, United States Phone Number: (210) 648-1111 Download link #1: <a href="https://6wuivqgrv2g7brcwhjw5co3vligiqowpumzkcyebku7i2busrvlxnzid.onion/HOLTCAT/PROOF/">https://6wuivqgrv2g7brcwhjw5co3vligiqowpumzkcyebku7i2busrvlxnzid.onion/HOLTCAT/PROOF/</a> Mirror: <a href="https://cactus5dqnqkppa5ayckiyk6dttpqwczdqphv5mxh4dkk5ct544q5aad.onion/HOLTCAT/PROOF/">https://cactus5dqnqkppa5ayckiyk6dttpqwczdqphv5mxh4dkk5ct544q5aad.onion/HOLTCAT/PROOF/</a> DATA DESCRIPTIONS: Personal identifiable information, database backups, corporate confidential data, financial\payroll docs, HR dept docs, projects, agreement, contracts, confidential engineering docs and drawings, customer information, employees\executives private data, corporate correspondence, etc.<img src="/uploads/I_Fit_Up_APPROVAL_MM_Kinder_Morgan_P202658_PO_6673092_0_KMPO_70c7e87d58.png" alt="IFit Up APPROVAL - MM-Kinder Morgan-P202658-PO# 6673092-0-KMPO.png"><img src="/uploads/Luis_Ramirez_50402f9b58.png" alt="Luis Ramirez.png"><img src="/uploads/I_9_and_passport_88b459585f.png" alt="I-9 and passport.png"><img src="/uploads/MM_S_and_B_M0010_Dryer_P_and_ID_P202622_9_18_24_868fa817c8.png" alt="MM-S&B-M0010-Dryer P&ID-P202622-9.18.24.png"><img src="/uploads/DL_Herb_2c4678bf9e.png" alt="DL Herb.png">

Sources

Victim siteholtcat.com
Leak posthttps://cactusbloguuodvqjmnzlwetjlpj6aggc6iocwhuupb47laukux7ckid.onion/posts/HOLTCAT

Source

Indexed 1 year 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 Cactus

**Overview:** Cactus is a ransomware group that emerged in July 2023, primarily motivated by financial gain through double extortion tactics targeting organizations across multiple sectors. The group has demonstrated rapid expansion, compromising 552 known victims within its first year of operation. **Origin & Affiliation:** Limited public information exists regarding Cactus's country of origin or specific affiliations with other ransomware groups, though their targeting patterns and operational methods suggest they operate as an independent entity rather than a Ransomware-as-a-Service model. **Attack Methodology:** Cactus ransomware operators employ double extortion tactics, stealing sensitive data before encrypting victim systems and threatening to leak the information if ransom demands are not met. The group appears to focus on gaining initial access through common vectors such as compromised credentials and vulnerable internet-facing applications, followed by lateral movement and data exfiltration prior to deployment of their encryption payload. **Notable Campaigns:** While specific high-profile incidents have not been extensively documented by major security agencies, the group's victim count of 552 organizations within approximately one year indicates sustained and aggressive targeting campaigns across North America and Europe. Their focus on manufacturing and business services sectors suggests deliberate targeting of organizations likely to pay ransoms due to operational dependencies. **Current Status:** Cactus remains an active ransomware threat as of late 2024, continuing to target organizations primarily in the United States, Canada, and European countries with no reported law enforcement disruptions or confirmed dissolution of their operations. The group has been linked to 552 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on July 20, 2023; most recent post March 21, 2025. The operation is currently inactive.

Timeline of this disclosure

February 26, 2025holtcat.com listed by Cactuson the group's public leak site

Ransom demanded: $1B

Other recent disclosures by Cactus

Cactus has been linked to 552 public victims on Darkfield. A sample of the most recent:

See the full Cactus dossier →

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Manufacturing sector, which has 3,681 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, holtcat.com is reported in United States, a country with 11,033 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

If your organisation is affected

A listing by Cactus means holtcat.com 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 Cactus'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.