Cyberattack goes global
Ransomware attack hits computers in several countries, including Russia
NEW YORK — Dozens of countries were hit with a huge cyberextortion attack Friday that locked up computers and held users’ files for ransom at a multitude of hospitals, companies and government agencies.
The attack appeared to exploit a vulnerability that was purportedly identified by the U.S. National Security Agency for its own intelligence-gathering purposes and was later leaked to the internet.
Britain’s national health service was hit hard, its hospitals forced to close wards and emergency rooms. Spain, Portugal and Russia were also struck.
Several cybersecurity firms said they had identified the malicious software behind the attack in upward of 60 countries, with Russia apparently the hardest hit.
The Russian Interior Ministry confirmed it was among those that fell victim to the “ransomware” — software that locks up a computer and typically flashes a message demanding payment to release the user’s data.
Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at Helsinki-based cybersecurity company F-Secure, called it “the biggest ransomware outbreak in history.”
Security experts said the attack appeared to be caused by a self-replicating piece of software that takes advantages of vulnerabilities in older versions of Microsoft Windows. It spreads from computer to computer as it finds exposed targets.
Its ransom demands start at $300 and increase after two hours to $400, $500 and then $600, said Kurt Baumgartner, a security researcher at Kaspersky Lab.
The security holes it exploits were disclosed several weeks ago by The Shadow Brokers, a mysterious group that has repeatedly published what it says are hacking tools used by the NSA as part of its intelligence-gathering.
Shortly after that disclosure, Microsoft announced that it had already issued software “patches” for those holes. But many companies and individuals haven’t installed the fixes yet or are using older versions of Windows that Microsoft no longer supports and didn’t fix.
Chris Wysopal of the software security firm Veracode said criminal organizations were probably behind the attack, given how quickly the malware spread.
By one security firm’s count, the malware struck at least 74 countries, including the U.S., where its effects seemed muted.