The Boot Hill Gallery and Gift Shop is sending a warning out to business owners and residents in town as a ransomware is currently crippling their computer system.

Owner of Boot Hill Gallery and Gift Shop Carol Bishop says she opened an email which looked like an invoice, and that's when the mayhem started. All of the shops files are now being held hostage by computer hackers, demanding a payment of bitcoins to release the files.

Bishop says they've lost everything.

"They encrypted all of our files including our backups, we've been advised to not pay the ransom because even if we do there's no guarantee we'll get our files back."

She explains everything is down, including their website, and it's affecting their ability to do business.

"This has really crippled us because now our computers are all shut down and will probably be for some time, so our online sales, emails, and everything we connect with our customers with is gone. Our website is even down, we had j-peg photos of artwork that we used for making calendars, and T-shirts they're all gone. These are things that we could probably put back on the computer but it would take hours and hours of time."

Bishop says it's scary how much information these strangers have now.

"All of our tax stuff, our invoices, everything is gone. So not only is this a tough hit, it's a financial one too, so just saying watch what you open on your computer, I carelessly opened an invoice that looked like a legit invoice, and this is where we're at."

Okotoks RCMP are investigating this case.

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