I think microsoft should be SUED for their software allowing these ransomware attacks to happen.

Look at the realtime live attacks happening now...

[link to intel.malwaretech.com (secure)]

Click connect to view worldwide map of attacks:

This ransomware attack is a dam WORM, not a virus. It is spreading all over the world.

Unpatched computers will get infected. Block all shares and port 445, and disable all shares and mapped network drives. That should help.

Yes I do think Microsoft should be sued for this. They knew about these back doors and security risks and did nothing and left their customers vulnerable. Back doors are deliberately put in that software and are no mistake. There should not be any back doors period into someone's operating system because it leaves the computer vulnerable. It is like leaving a secret door unlocked to your house and the secret door is just hidden by a bush and can still be found.

[link to www.bankinfosecurity.com]

Spanish telecommunications giant Telefonica has reportedly instructed all employees to power down their systems in the wake of a massive ransomware attack. In addition, multiple National Health Service trusts in England say they've been hit with ransomware.

Microsoft probably contracted with the NSA in the first place. The NSA should be sued also. This is NOT a virus, it is a WORM, in which if one machine on a network is infected, it will spread to every machine on the network via mapped drives, and file shares. A quick fix would be to disable all file shares and network drive mappings, and disable port 445 at the firewall. That should help stop the spread of it.

The argument people are making that says people should have patched their computers and it is their fault if they didn't is invalid because the security holes should have never been there to begin with.

You are absolutely right. They shouldn't have been there to begin with. Microsoft and the NSA should be sued for this crap and be held accountable for it and pay for the damage.

The entire operating system will have to be re-installed on all these machines infected to eliminate the worm. That is going to take a lot of time to fix all the damage that has occurred.

How else do you think the gubberment can spy on the people?

How did Microsoft allow the attacks to happen?

Open source software will be the future.
This attack will wake up a lot of people and will switch to open source.

I left ms with windows 10. I am boss over my computer.

Isn't it awesome that wanting to spy on anyone the NSA created the very tools of global disaster?
This will be epic for a week or two and then the economy collapses globally.
Who can afford a computer or smartphone then?

I always make an entire hard drive image backup every 3 days on an external drive and disconnect it from the internet.

That way if a catastrophic worm infects my machine, I can restore the entire hard drive image.

Macrium reflect is an exellent hard drive imaging tool and it is free. It will make an image of your entire hard drive that can be restored by a bootable CD or DVD if something catastrophic occurs. All you have to do is boot from the bootable CD or DVD created and you can restore your entire hard drive in less than 20-30 minutes.

[link to www.macrium.com (secure)]

Microsoft figures by having a Terms of Service agreement that absolves them of any liability in use of their stupid operating system should be challenged in court. Imagine if car companies could get away with the amount of shit that Microsoft does for buggy products and insecure products. The car companies would just make you sign an agreement before driving their death trap of car saying you won't hold them liable if the breaks gave out on you on the highway. I don't think Microsoft should get away this time for their buggy software. They have almost a monopoly in the market place in terms of operating systems and should be held to higher standard than a gaming company.

Red Hat going to benefit from this

you are right but now they got an alibi for nuclear war see

gov arrangement back in day for law enforcement

Their software is the problem. They blame the public for not installing the latest updates and security patches. Those patches should be forced out to all the machines automatically. The security holes should not have been there in the first place. It is microsoft's fault. It amazes me how they can let this kind of thing happen.

Plus the fact the Microsoft cannot be considered entirely a private company when it colluding with governments to spy on its users which leaves them vulnerable to hacks like this.

I hope our nuclear weapons systems are not using microsoft's software connected to the internet. That would be a very BAD day if our country's defense systems and nuclear weapons were infected by a worm.

The problem with some of their update is they are buggy and brick some people's computers so you can't even trust their stupid updates!

Here is a very interesting documentary to watch...Command and Control...

An accident occurs during maintenance on a nuclear missile.

[link to www.pbs.org]

These kind of attacks on computers running linux are not possible. Linux is a very secure operating system. You won't see this shit happening on a linux machine.

Microsnot patch their software, most people and businesses that are hit by this type of malware are using out of date software, have updates switched off or are blocking updates to avoid compatibility issues.

It only takes one idiot on a well connected computer or Remote Desktop Server to trigger server shared folders to start encrypting. The more powerful the server, the quicker files are encrypted.

Companies have reduced their IT staff while allowing more and more devices to be connected to their networks, people are sprawling their data far and wide, using a multitude of communication applications and cloud storage.

The big data companies are competing with each other fearing they may become the next IBM, fading away into irrelevance.

Outsourcing IT staff overseas, paying low wages, investing in train (because they will up and leave as soon as they have marketable skills.

As an ex (burned out) IT worker I laugh at the total mess companies are getting themselves into. Digital Armageddon rather than WWIII. Fuck the Bean Counters and company bosses who saw IT Staff as an obstructive and unnecessary cost. My their IT systems crash and burn.

I am an IT administrator myself. I have our company covered. I make a daily hard drive IMAGE of ALL workstations on the network and hard drive image of the servers DAILY. It shit like this happens, I am ready for it.

The entire world would be a lot safer if everyone ran linux as their operating systems.

You mean the controlled blue screens? To force you to buy the next product to never allow another golden product like XP or win 7? Products that actualy worked as promised?!

Yeah - I know about them!

All I can say to you hackers that that caused this mess to bring it on... I am ready! I can have our entire network and workstations restored in less than 24 hours. You hackers should be put in prison for causing this mess. You people are EVIL attacking hospital networks and critical networks.

Maybe you are slow on the news, or something, but the owner of MalwareTech bought a domain yesterday that activated a kill switch that stopped the virus from propagating further.

Basically the virus kept contacting a domain that didn't exist, so the above guy at MalewareTech registered that domain and stopped it.

[link to securityaffairs.co]

One of the reasons why linux is so 'safe' is that almost no one uses it.