Microsoft was also keen to point out that the attack took place because organizations failed to keep their systems up-to-date from a security point-of-view, which eventually led the virus to spread exponentially.
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The “Wannacry” virus locks users out of their computers and demands hundreds of dollars from victims hoping to regain control of their documents and data. The WannaCry Ransomware virus is believed to have hit 200,000 victims in 150 countries, including United Kingdom hospitals, utilities in Spain, and Russia’s interior ministry.
Governments and computer experts girded today for a possible worsening of the global cyberattack that has hit more than 150 countries, as Microsoft warned against stockpiling vulnerabilities like the one at the heart of the crisis.
This is a function that allows computers to share files and communicate over the internet.
“If a company finds they have fallen victim to a cyberattack they should switch off their computers and inform an IT professional immediately”. “It’s a business model that works and you don’t need a lot of investment to actually get a decent return”, said Wellsmore.
The world is facing the most unsafe cyberattack it ever had to deal with so far, and it’s an attack that it can’t be stopped entirely for the time being.
“Until this weekend’s attack, Microsoft declined to officially confirm this, as US Gov refused to confirm or deny this was their exploit”, wrote NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden in a tweet.
Citing the far-reaching potential impact on customers, Microsoft took the unusual step of offering a custom support security update for users with versions of Windows that are no longer supported.
Other victims were most likely small and medium-sized businesses.
“It’s incredible we’re seeing this problem at all, organisations have had a two month lead time to patch this exploit”.
“Even if a fresh attack does not materialise on Monday, we should expect it soon afterwards”, she said.
It turns out that the code used in the hack was actually code that was previously stockpiled by the NSA and Microsoft has now issued a statement which is basically blaming the NSA for the hacks, you can see the statement below.
The initial wave of infections affects organizations including FedEx, Russia’s Interior Ministry, Spanish telecommunications company Telefonica, and the U.K.’s National Health Service.
In Japan, both Nissan and Hitachi reported some units had been affected, while in China energy giant PetroChina said that at some petrol stations customers had been unable to use its payment system.
“What we are seeing is the exact same features that have occurred overseas: a freezing of their IT systems and a ransomware note”, he told the ABC. “At this stage, we do not have any evidence that patient data has been accessed”. Renault shut down several French factories after the cyberattack, and one of Nissan’s United Kingdom factories was also impacted.
Experts said it appeared that the ransomware had made just over $32,000, although they expected that number to pop when people went back into the office Monday.
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CERT-In further said that it sent out advisory to the Reserve Bank of India on the matter, on Saturday itself. But ransomware is different.
