Czech Republic Ninth Most Affected by Yesterday’s Cyber Attacks

Europe suffered sweeping cyberattacks Tuesday, complicating operations throughout banks and government agencies

Expats.cz Staff Jason Pirodsky

Written by Expats.cz Staff,  Jason Pirodsky Published on 28.06.2017 11:44:24 (updated on 28.06.2017) Reading time: 1 minute

Daily News

A series of cyber attacks gradually struck Ukraine, Russia, and most of Europe yesterday with Russian oil giant Rosneft, Ukrainian banks, Kiev’s main airport, and French construction company Saint-Gobain among the hardest hit, Aktualne.cz is reporting.

Infected computers display a message demanding a Bitcoin ransom worth $300; those who pay are told to send confirmation of payment to an email address. 

Advertisement In-article Health

According to Slovak-based IT security company ESET, the Czech Republic was the ninth most affected state in Europe.

In addition to the Czech Republic, Italy, Israel, Serbia, and a host of other Central and Eastern European countries were significantly affected.

In Ukraine, the virus has infected government computers. The Russian office of Home Credit, which includes the Czech financial group PPF, reported “unusual activity” on their servers.

According to a release from the Czech National Cyber Security Center (NCKB), “The completely new ransomware NotPetya began to spread over Tuesday and quickly infect a large number of computers, particularly in Ukraine, Russia, France, Denmark and Spain.”

The agency says it will continue to “Monitor the situation in the Czech Republic, more information will be added soon.” 

Head of the Ukrainian Security Council Oleksandr Turčynov said that the incident “at first glance” bears features of a Russian cyber attack.

Analysts are calling it the biggest hack in Ukraine’s history (for some levity, see how the country’s government officials reacted on Twitter, below).

The NCKB warns, “Users are recommended in addition to continuous updates to the operating system, antivirus protection and security to take extra caution when working with unsolicited e-mails and unknown files…no protection is absolute and thus the most effective solution is to backup.”

Did you like this article?

#in the news
Would you like us to write your article? Explore the options

Other daily news

Advertisement Advertise with Expats.cz

Partner articles

FEATURED JOBS

View all jobs

TRENDING ARTICLES

POPULAR ARTICLES