WannaCry virus logs in to Asia

Ransomware hits Japan, China, Indonesia; no major outbreaks reported

The worldwide “ransomware” cyberattack spread to thousands more computers on Monday as people across Asia logged in at work, disrupting businesses, schools, hospitals and daily life.

But no new large-scale outbreaks were reported, and British officials said a feared second wave of infections had not materialised.

The new infections were largely in Asia, which had been closed for business when the malware first struck.

In Britain, whose health service was among the first high-profile targets of the online extortion scheme, health secretary Jeremy Hunt said “we have not seen a second wave of attacks.”

He said “the level of criminal activity is at the lower end of the range that we had anticipated.”

The malware, known as “WannaCry,” paralysed computers running factories, banks, government agencies and transport systems, hitting 200,000 victims in more than 150 countries.

Among those hit were Russia’s interior ministry and companies including Spain’s Telefonica and FedEx Corp. in the US.

Though the spread of the ransomware slowed on Monday, many companies and government agencies were still struggling to recover from the first attack.

In Asia, where Friday’s attack occurred after business hours, thousands of new cases were reported on Monday as people came back to work.

The Japan Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Center, a nonprofit group, said 2,000 computers at 600 locations in Japan were affected. Companies including Hitachi and Nissan Motor Co. reported problems but said they had not seriously affected their operations.

Chinese state media said 29,372 institutions there had been infected along with hundreds of thousands of devices.

Universities and other educational institutions in China were among the hardest hit, possibly because schools tend to have old computers and be slow to update operating systems and security, said Fang Xingdong, founder of ChinaLabs, an internet strategy think tank.

On social media, students complained about not being able to access their work, and people in various cities said they hadn’t been able to take their driving tests over the weekend because some local traffic police systems were down.

Railway stations, mail delivery, gas stations, hospitals, office buildings, shopping malls and government services also were affected, China’s Xinhua News Agency said, citing the Threat Intelligence Center of Qihoo 360, an internet security services company. In Indonesia, the malware locked patient files on computers in two hospitals in the capital.