The massive cyberattack targeting computer systems of businesses, government agencies and citizens in more than 150 countries is now being linked to the North Korean government. Called WannaCry, the ransomware encrypts the victim’s hard drive and demands a ransom to be paid in the virtual currency bitcoin equivalency of about $300.

According to the Washington Post:

Several security researchers studying “WannaCry” on Monday found evidence of possible connections to, for instance, the crippling hack on Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2014 attributed by the U.S. government to North Korea. That hack occurred in the weeks before Sony released a satiric movie about a plot to kill North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The New York Times reported that the malicious software was transmitted via email and stolen from the National Security Agency. It targeted vulnerabilities in Windows systems in one of the largest ransomware attacks on record. The virus took advantage of a weakness in Microsoft’s Windows operating system. Although the flaw was patched by the company, not all users had applied the update.Institutions and government agencies affected included the Russian Interior Ministry, FedEx in the United States and Britain’s National Health Service.

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http://www.riskmanagementmonitor.com/north-korea-now-suspected-in-ransomware-attack/