Encrypted email service provider ProtonMail has reportedly been forced to pay 15 bitcoins (the equivalent of $6,000) to hackers after they successfully accessed the company's database.

The company is reported to have promptly gone offline again after the attack. The hackers are apparently asking for more ransom payment. According to The Hosting News, ProtonMail has described the attack as quite unprecedented in size and scope. The company believes that the attacks came from two groups working out of Switzerland.

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Officials at the company say they were placed under a lot of pressure and third parties urged them to just pay the ransom money.

"We hoped that by paying, we could spare the other companies impacted by the attack against us, but the attacks continued nevertheless. This was clearly a wrong decision so let us be clear to all future attackers, ProtonMail will NEVER pay another ransom", the company said.

The Register reported that ProtonMail received a note from the hackers threatening to shut down their internet just before midnight on Monday, Nov. 2 if the company refuses to pay the ransom money. ProtonMail ignored the demand, and the next morning a 15-minute attack knocked its dedicated server's offline. A few hours later after the attack ended, another assault resumed.

The attackers are targeting the company's upstream connectivity that dumps 100Gbps of packets on its ISP within a couple of hours. Hundreds of customers in Germany and Switzerland, who have been without internet access as a result of the incident, have put pressure on ProtonMail to pay the ransom.

ProtonMail reported that they need to upgrade their IT infrastructure because it cannot handle any more floods of duff traffic. The firm estimates that the renovation will cost about $100,000.

To combat these DDoS attacks, the company has launched a campaign to raise $50,000. This campaign will allow the company to cover the cost of DDoS protection.

Tagsprotonmail, hackers, Switzerland, Germany, DDoS Attack