On Friday, CCN-CERT, the Spanish computer emergency response team, published an advisory linked to the ransomware attacks. The outbreak was first reported in the United Kingdom, where hospital computers suddenly got locked by ransomware demanding $300 in bitcoin to give back acccess to files.
Spain is the latest nation to warn of a global surge in ransomware.
The attack caused the crash of the computers of Telefonica personnel at the company’s Madrid headquarters in “Las Tablas” to the north of the capital, leaving them with blue screens and also halting other devices.
“Seeing a large telco like Telefonica get hit is going to get everybody anxious”.
O2 parent Telefonica has been hit by a cyber attack from hackers today (May 12) in an attempt to infect computers with ransomware.
The National Health Service (NHS) said 16 organizations had been affected by the cyber attack but said it had not been specifically targeted.
Allan Liska, senior solutions architect at security company Recorded Future said this ransomware first appeared on 31 March but the version that is rapidly spreading has some significant changes, using the vulnerability outlined in Microsoft Security Bulletin (MS17-010), also known as EternalBlue.
There were no details available on the origin of the attack.
In Spain, some big firms took pre-emptive steps to thwart ransomware attacks following a warning from the National Cryptology Centre of “a massive ransomware attack”.
In Spain, the attacks did not disrupt the provision of services or network operations, the government said in a statement.
NHS Digital says the attack “was not specifically targeted at the NHS and is affecting organizations from across a range of sectors”. “Ambulances are being diverted to neighboring hospitals”.
Hospitals and doctors’ surgeries in parts of England were forced to turn away patients and cancel appointments.
It then drops ransom notes to a user in a text file, demanding $300 worth of bitcoins to be paid to unlock the infected files within a certain period of time.
The Barts Health group, which manages major central London hospitals including The Royal London and St Bartholomew’s, said it had activated a major incident plan and had canceled routine appointments.
Momentous News 2017