Cyberattack Spreads in Asia; Thousands of Groups Affected
By GERRY MULLANY and PAUL MOZUR
MAY 15, 2017
HONG KONG — A global cyberattack spread to thousands of additional computers on Monday as workers logged in at the start of a new workweek.
Universities, hospitals, businesses and daily life were disrupted, but no catastrophic breakdowns were reported. In Europe, where the cyberattack first emerged, officials said it appeared that a much-feared second wave — based on copycat variants of the original malicious software — had not yet materialized.
The new disruptions were most apparent in Asia, where many workers had already left on Friday when the attack broke out.
China alone reported disruptions at nearly 40,000 organizations, including about 4,000 academic institutions, figures that experts say are most likely to be low estimates, given the prevalence of pirated software there.
The list of affected institutions includes two of China’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, Tsinghua and Peking Universities; a movie theater chain in South Korea; and blue-chip companies in Japan like Hitachi and Nissan, which emphasized that their business operations had not been impaired.
The cyberattack has afflicted 200,000 computers in more than 150 countries. Transmitted by email, the malicious software, or malware, locks users out of their computers, threatening to destroy data if a ransom is not paid.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/15/world/asia/china-cyberattack-hack-ransomware.html .
