POLICE have urged businesses to avoid paying ransoms to a "known online criminal group" which is targeting firms.
Several companies have been subjected to extortion demands through attacks on their website or servers.
Detective Chief Inspector Douglas Grant from the PSNI's cyber crime centre said: "The ransom demands to date have carried the threat of a cyber attack being inflicted on the company and this attack may take the form of a DDOS attack (Distributed Denial of Service) which may disrupt or shut down company web services or networks."
Inspector Grant said the threats were being investigated and urged anyone who receives such a demand to report it immediately to police.
