What could possibly go wrong?

Lately I ’ ve had t his really annoying email problem. Every time I touch Outlook it freezes. I know, I know. First world problem, right? Or possibly an end of world problem.

As I’ve said before, every time anything odd happens on the computer, I wonder what’s going on out there that they’re not telling us. Sometimes computers are just weird, even new ones. But right now, we know something is going on.

Specifically, last week, unknown hackers conducted a massive “ransomware” attack on companies and governments around the world. The hackers used “WannaCry” malware that was based on American National Security Agency tools that had been “dumped” online a month earlier by other unknown hackers. The hacks exposed vulnerabilities in commonly used software, including older versions of Windows. Users were especially vulnerable if they didn’t apply readily available software “patches” to plug the holes. Which they often didn’t, in large organizations as well as at isolated desks.

I mean, why bother? What could possibly go wrong if you lost all your data, couldn’t send emails, had confidential communications revealed to the world, or critical systems shut down?

Do you leave your car unlocked? Probably not. Yet you likely store far more valuable things in your computer than your car, like your banking information, for instance. I’d guess that most of us could now more easily get through a day without our cars than our computers. Yet we spend thousands on maintaining our vehicles, but little — if anything — on maintaining or securing our computers. When problems arise, we flail about, find something that sort of works, and then leave it be.

Of course, one reason for this is that a lot of people don’t understand their computers. Even by comparison with what they don’t know about their car nowadays, including that it’s a computer on wheels that no amateur can tinker with.

Lest I appear to condescend, let me emphasize that I have no way of knowing whether my problems with Outlook are related to last week’s big hack, or something else. Barring taking the computer in, I also have little way of finding out. I Googled and nothing turned up.

Oh well. Maybe a lot of recently deleted bulky email is still lurking in what I believe is a secondary trash bin. Or not. I suppose I could reinstall Office, but then I’d lose all my customizations, which are a pain to set up. So I just, um, flail about, find something that sort of works, leave it be and hope the problem goes away.

Probably it will, because Microsoft will fix it. Or, the world will end, so email won’t matter. Either way, the problem will be taken care of.

Those in charge are most- ly taking the same position.

We all know by now that this wretched WannaCry attack affected hundreds of thousands of computers in more than 150 countries. The hackers threatened to delete data if the victims didn’t pay a ransom in “bitcoins” — a term that most of the victims probably had to look up. And according to a Washington Post article entitled “The era of cyber- disaster may finally be here,” the attack was known to be overdue.

That “finally” isn’t very reassuring, is it? Unfortunately, almost nobody backs up crucial data, which is what would enable users to tell blackmailers to “Eat my Ethernet,” clean their machine( s) and reinstall their files. That would take too much effort. Plus, as I’ve also said before, a troubling aspect of today’s connected world is that people at the top — the ones with decades of experience — tend to be the least informed about their companies’ information technology, which is one of the most crucial aspects of any organization today.

Thus, Britain’s National Health Service was badly fouled up by the attack. Ambulances had to be rerouted and, with patient records inaccessible, surgeries cancelled. It doesn’t help that the lavishly-paid people running it into the ground have even less grasp of computing than economics. Indeed the whole thing would have been a lot worse if …

Go on. Guess. If some diploma- less 20- something surrounded by pizza boxes in his mother’s basement hadn’t stumbled on the kill switch? As if. He lives upstairs. But now the ransomware has mutated. So what next?

On Monday, I pounced on my latest “Crypto- gram” bulletin from cybersecurity expert Bruce Schneier. His analysis started “There’s something going on inside the intelligence communities in at least two countries, and we have no idea what it is.” Oh great. He says somebody, probably a state actor, is dumping NSA cyberattack tools onto the Internet. Somebody else, or the same somebody, is dumping CIA tools. And the NSA is counter- boasting how deep they got into Russia’s cyberhacker establishment.

Tuesday brought news that the recent culprit is probably North Korea, of all loser states. Great. Titans clash over our heads. Vain, angry, clumsy ones who get hacked as often as they hack.

Everything is so connected now that a really devastating Internet attack would be a real “First World Problem.” Not something trivial for spoiled people to fret over. Something bringing our lives to a crashing halt. Yet how many hours a week do political or business leaders — except possibly Vladimir Putin — spend receiving and discussing cybersecurity briefings?

Why would you? What could happen? Other, I mean, than the world ending, not with a bang but a frozen screen.