Table of Contents 64q43
Once again in recent months, Europe has woken up in alert: this Friday (12), hackers managed to invade the internal systems of several companies in Spain, Portugal and even the United Kingdom. In the attack, no large service was completely stopped, but both the Portugal Telecom, as for the Spanish Telefónica, out of the blue Living and one of the largest companies on the European continent, were inaccessible for your employees. Understand: 3h5b3
The attacks started during the morning, when the employees of the Phone and several other European companies were told to stop working and turn off their computers: the network of this, and several other companies around the world, had been kidnapped and it was inaccessible.
On their computer screens, employees could see a message explaining what had happened: according to the criminals themselves, all data was now encrypted and would only be released after a deposit of approx. US$ 300, made in Bitcoin – an electronic and untraceable currency, commonly used in this type of attack.
Despite completely stopping the company's internal operations, Telefónica, no consumer had their services affected. Already the subscribers of Portugal Telecom, however, they were without communication by TV, internet and telephone for some hours. The main affected companies do not say how much of their systems was compromised, but it is estimated that at least 80% of Telefónica's operation, in Spain, was interdicted by the action of the cyber terrorists.
In Brazil 3d6648
According to the security company Kaspersky, hackers were not restricted to Europe, although the main attacks took place in Spain and Portugal. Directly or indirectly, more than 74 countries were affected, including Brazil: units in the INSS, systems of Ministry Public and even the Courts de Justice in the country had their online operations paralyzed. Apparently, the cause of the stoppage was not an attack, but the fear that these bodies would also have their data hijacked.
With regard to Spain's Telefónica: employees of Living, the company's representative in the Brazil, received the following statement this afternoon:
“Telefónica Spain informs that this morning a cybersecurity incident was detected that affected some computers of employees who are on the company's corporate network. The security protocol for such incidents was immediately activated with the intention of getting the affected computers back up and running as quickly as possible. Telefônica Brasil was not impacted by the security incident, but even so, it is taking preventive measures to ensure the normality of its operation.”
According to the national press, the company also advised its employees not to use the company's corporate network. Living, the suspicion was that if they tried, communications could be intercepted and some breach would cause this information to be stolen.
the hijacking of data 6f26m
The technique used by the hackers has not yet been completely unveiled, but it seems that the attacked companies suffered from an invasion by ransomware. In these cases, software hijacks and encrypts all of the victim's data and then demands a ransom to give back access to the files.
Because it works with encryptions of high sophistication, most of the time, it is not always feasible to try to solve the problem alone: the only alternative that many people have, including perhaps companies, is abide the orders of criminal and do whatever is asked.
Hackers realized that instead of erasing or leaking data, it is more advantageous kidnap them and charge a ransom for them. According to what experts say, the only ways to be protected against the practice is to carry out Backups newspapers, in order to avoid that you run out of files in cases of kidnapping, and keep your operating system always up to date.
Being careful when accessing files from the internet also prevents infections by ransomware, but in cases of large targets like the one in Europe, the attack is targeted and more difficult to prevent.
The dimension of the attack 2t3j11
As we stated above, it is not easy to scale an attack like this. According to the information, in addition to the Phone Spain e Portugal Telecom, police and health services across Europe are also at a reduced capacity. Everything related to the virtual systems of these services has been shut down, causing the redirection of ambulances and the reducing in emergency care.
It is expected that the governments of the countries directly affected to intervene in the cases, but everything is still too obscure to suspect a single agent. The very low amount requested for the attacked targets, US$ 300 in bitcoins, raises the suspicion that this is an attack cyberterrorist, much more than a simple data theft for financial gain.
Microsoft Positioning 2a3n9
In the first reports of the attack, it was stated that several versions of the Windows contained flaws that allowed the introduction of the WannaCry, the name of the tool used by hackers. According to Microsoft, the flaw compromised several OS versions, from Windows 7 to Windows 10, including Windows Server variants.
In the same note in which it itted the existence of the flaw, MS also stated that in March it released the update MS17-010, which protects the system against this and several other software techniques malicious. To the update, you can either go to Microsoft's official website, looking for the update for the system you are using, or update yourself. Windows Update, heading to the Control > Windows Update > Check Updates.
