Biggest Ransomware Attack in History Halted By The 'Accidental Hero'

Last updated: January 24, 2024 Reading time: 4 minutes
Disclosure
Share
WannaCry

More than 45,000 cyber-attacks were recorded in nearly 99 countries around the world, including the UK, Russia, India, China, Ukraine, Italy, and Egypt. A ransomware cyber-attack that was supposed to have originated by mugging the ‘cyber weapons’ linked to the US government crippled a number of hospitals in England and spread worldwide in no less than 24 hours.

Relate article: what is torrenting and how it works

The chief scientist, Markus Jakobsson, from security firm Agari, said that the attack was ‘scattershot’ instead of targeted. He further said, ‘It’s a very broad spread whereas the ransom demand is relatively small.’

In the mid of April, the malware got leaked by a group called ‘Shadow Brokers’ from an archive of powerful software tools designed apparently by the National Security Agency –NSA – to defile and control Windows computers. However, not even a whole month later, the threat of rumoring that the criminals would use the leaked malware tool against the public turned out to be real and attacked hundreds of thousands of computers worldwide.