Cyber Attack Warning

[Terri_Stevens]

Hello everyone , this message has nothing to do with Photoshop and I don't want to alarm anyone, but at 3pm GMT a massive cyber attack began in Europe. It involves 'ransomware' which encrypts files on a computer and is causing chaos in hospitals, doctors surgeries , some telecom companies and FedEx is also reporting problems now in the US. So far 40,000 infections have been reported in Europe, China and Australia. The USA may be next as the working day begins.

If you receive an email with an attachment in the next 24 hours exercise maximum caution. Antivirus software will not necessary detect this malware.

[Ronald Keller]

Thank you Terri.

[Terri_Stevens]

Hi Ronald,

I probably shouldn't bring up this sort of thing in the forum , but this seems to be a particularly serious attack. Apparently the British Prime Minister is making a statement later and that's unheard of for this kind of thing. If a few people avoid problems I therefore think it's worth posting.

[Ronald Keller]

Hi Terri,

Agreed that this is an exceptional serious situation and as such I'm sure

that people understand why you posted it.

After all, as one says, it's better to be safe than sorry.

​Greetings from Belgium,

Ronald

2017-05-12 21:10 GMT+02:00 Terri Stevens <forums_noreply@adobe.com>:

Adobe Community <https://forums.adobe.com/?et=watches.email.thread>

Cyber Attack Warning

reply from Terri Stevens

<https://forums.adobe.com/people/Terri+Stevens?et=watches.email.thread>

in Photoshop General Discussion - View the full discussion

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[Trevor.Dennis]

Apparently MS put out a patch a couple of months ago, so you should be OK so long as you keep your OS up to date.   It spreads via network, so you need to make sure all machines are updated.

[Terri_Stevens]

yes I think the main problem has occurred with unpatched systems. Would you believe some of the National Health Service hospitals in the UK still use Windows XP which is full of holes. It's easy to criticise but they have a lot of very expensive  bespoke software that refuses to run on later versions of Windows. By expensive I mean costing 5 or 6 billion pounds-so they can't simply dump it. A friend of mine had an appointment at St Bartholemews in London yesterday and got turned away because without the computers up and running the haematology department couldn't print out labels for the blood specimen bottles-a crazy over dependence on automation in my opinion. I find Microsoft Outlook very good at separating out real email from spam and attempts to break into your system. Unless you click on the junk folder you simply never see it.

[JJMack]

It must be really bad for Microsoft to make a patch to old unsupported versions of the OS.   Imagine that unsupported software fixed. Here is something I read.

"

On Friday, May 12, countless organizations around the world began fending off attacks from a ransomware strain variously known as WannaCrypt, WanaDecrypt and Wanna.Cry. Ransomware encrypts a victim’s documents, images, music and other files unless the victim pays for a key to unlock them.

It quickly became apparent that Wanna was spreading with the help of a file-sharing vulnerability in Windows. Microsoft issued a patch to fix this flaw back in March 2017, but organizations running older, unsupported versions of Windows (such as Windows XP) were unable to apply the update because Microsoft no longer supplies security patches for those versions of Windows.

The software giant today made an exception to that policy after it became clear that many organizations hit hardest by Wanna were those still running older, unsupported versions of Windows.

[gener7]

BleepingComputer has a good rundown: Wana Decryptor / WanaCrypt0r Technical Nose Dive

[Guest]

Microsoft released a patch for older operating systems

More info

Microsoft Releases Patch for Older Windows Versions to Protect Against Wana Decrypt0r

[cyberwasp]

Terri, I hope you don't mind but I posted your message on Facebook to the public. Thank you for alerting us!

[Terri_Stevens]

Not at all Cyberwasp, the more people who know there is a threat the quicker it can be brought under control. I think the good news from this is the people who did it haven't made that much money. It's possible to track the volume of trading in Bitcoin and in the UK yesterday they estimate only £20,000 has been paid in ransom. It's a bit sad that the tool they used came from the National Security Agency in America, although it was stolen in a separate hack , but on the other hand the fact Russia is the worst affected country might remind Mr Putin that two can play at cyber espionage when necessary.

[Trevor.Dennis]

There is a nice article  on the BBC today (my time) about a tech expert who has accidentally found a fix.  Accident or not, it was still very clever.  Scroll down to MalwareTech Blog

Cyber-attack: Europol says it was unprecedented in scale - BBC News

Actually, just go straight to the source

https://www.malwaretech.com/

I had to smile when I read that the UK NHS has been badly affected.  An old mate of mine does the IT for a number of NHS sites, and I suspect his name is mud right now.  I'll email him later for the lowdown, and ask if he still has a job.    Everything here is set to auto update in regards to OS, but what about those brave souls who have stuck with Windows XP?   I have also noticed a much larger influx of dodgy emails with attachments in the last couple of weeks, and that is apparently how you get infected.