Unstoppable? India braces for cyberbug

STICK UP Second wave of global ransomware attack likely on Monday; virus likely to be stronger; Asia to take biggest hit MONDAY IS EXPECTED

TO BE A BUSY DAY,

ESPECIALLY IN ASIA

WHICH MAY NOT HAVE

SEEN THE WORST OF

THE IMPACT YET

ransomware worm that stopped car factories, hospitals, shops and schools over the weekend could wreak fresh havoc on Monday when employees log back on, cyber security experts warned.

The spread of the virus ‘WannaCry’, which locked up more than 100,000 computers, had slowed on Sunday, but new versions of the worm were expected even while the world was yet to take stock of the extent of damage from Friday’s attack.

Marin Ivezic, cybersecurity partner at PwC, said some clients had been “working around the clock since the story broke” to restore systems and install software updates or restore systems from backups.

Microsoft released patches last month and on Friday to fix a vulnerability that allowed the worm to spread across networks. Code for exploiting that bug, known as “Eternal Blue,” was released in March by a hacking group known as the Shadow Brokers.

The group claimed it was stolen from a repository of National Security Agency hacking tools. The agency has not responded to requests for comment. The US cybersecurity researcher who helped halt the WannaCry attack, Darien Huss, said on Sunday that it wouldn’t be difficult for those responsible to re-release it or for others to mimic it — and this time it would not be reined in.

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