Given that it was originally revealed as an NSA creation by
Edward Snowden’s whistle-blowing, could the recent WannaCry Ransomware cyber attacks
someday trigger a malware apocalypse?
By: Ringo Bones
The so-called “Zombie Apocalypse” might have been only a
product of Hollywood, but the recent Ransomware malware attacks is not only
real but painfully tangible for us who have grown dependent to the global
internet infrastructure. The WannaCry Ransomware cyber attacks started back in May
12, 2017 and traced to be triggered in the Hong Kong – Singapore time zone in
the South-East Asian region and then spread to over 150 countries. The
worst-hit countries were reported to be Russia, Ukraine, India and Taiwan. It
eventually infected more than 230,000 computers in over 150 countries but got
press notice only after the malware affected Britain’s National Health Service
(NHS) and scores of children’s hospitals in the UK.
The WannaCry Ransomware was found to specifically infect
systems that have not been updated with the most recent security updates –
especially the one issued by Microsoft back in March 14, 2017. The Ransomware
malware also managed to scare the pants off of conspiracy theorists after I.T.
experts found out that it uses the EternalBlue Exploit developed by the U.S.
National Security Agency (NSA) as revealed by the whistle-blower Edward Snowden.
It got the moniker “Ransomware” after the NSA-developed
malware got into the hands of criminal hackers who extorted money to computer
system owners affected by their malware attack. They usually ask for 500 to 600
U.S. dollars worth in bitcoins to restore their computer systems into full
working order. Sadly, there are variants of the Ransomware malware that doesn’t
have the kill-switch that can be turned off by the criminal hackers after you
pay then the required bitcoin funds.
