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India hit by ransomware virus

Xinhua, May 13, 2017 Adjust font size:

A massive cyber attack that has struck organizations in dozens of countries across the world since Friday evening, has hit India too.

Indian officials said Saturday that the global WannaCry ransomware cyber attack has affected about 25 percent of the computers - more than 100 in number - used by the police in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh.

"The 25 percent of police computers infected with the ransomware were mostly using the Windows operating system. Cyber experts were trying to debug the hacked computers," Inspector General of Andhra Pradesh Police E. Damodarm told the media.

Gulshan Rai, director general of the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, has also confirmed the attack.

"We held an assessment meeting today (Saturday) and have found that 102 systems of Andhra Police have been infected with ransomware, particularly those using the Windows operating system. Our experts are on the job," he said.

He said the extent of the attack will be clear only Monday, which is a working day, and Saturday being a government holiday.

WannaCry encrypts a computer's files and demands a ransom payment before allowing access again, security experts have said. Endit