North Korea blamed for WannaCry ransomware invasion

Typically, hacker groups often claim attacks and intrusions. However, most of these actions are aimed at political ends, to show a point or to denounce something. With the WannaCrypt (WannaCry) ransomware, the story is different and has virtually two key points: money and why. The question now is another. Who is behind this attack? According to a Google researcher, North Korea.

Hackers, the final tip of this process, just took advantage of the flaw

You see, this is not the time to point culprits, but to understand the whole chain of events. Ultimately, the blame lies in the process: at Microsoft that has a user-friendly Windows Update, at the NSA that exploited the Windows exploit and let it leak, and even the companies themselves. affected by not investing the right amount and not delivering the necessary tools in infrastructure and IT staff. Hackers, the final tip of this process, just took advantage of the flaw - the fault, as always, lies with the system.

Initially, WannaCry ransomware was believed to have been born in China. However, indications were scarce, and there was no way to pin that claim. Now Google security researcher Neel Mehta has found evidence that a group of North Korean hackers is behind the attack that infected more than 300, 000 computers in more than 150 countries.

Similarities

Government attack?

What Neel found was in the WannaCry code. The devastating ransomware has a few lines identical to the code used in the malicious Cantoppe backdoor, which was developed by the Lazarus Group - and this point opens up a more dangerous question.

Lazarus Group is believed to be a government-sponsored hacker group from North Korea. The question is: WannaCry was an attack thought and sponsored by a government or an action of a group sponsored but not governed by the government?

Has the North Korean government sponsored this attack or not?

To reinforce the evidence found by Neel, other security researchers from leading companies such as Kaspersky Lab, Symantec and Intezer also found and confirmed the connection between WannaCry and Cantoppe, according to The Hackers News.

Some of the achievements made by the Lazarus Group simply devastated some companies, showing that yes, the hacking team has the power to do so. One example was the attack on Sony Pictures, which cost the Japanese company a lot of money in 2014. In addition, Lazarus is blamed for stealing more than $ 80 million from a bank in Bangladesh in 2016.

Despite all this, it is not possible to nail this answer. Lazarus is the closest final link, but one must always remember that the blame is actually in the process on this system.

It's not over

WannaCry 2.0

WannaCrypt ransomware, also known as WannaCry, ravaged the world last Friday (12). It has been reported that security expert Marcus Hutchins (@malwaretech), while buying a domain name on the internet, has disrupted malware activities. However, ransomware has only slowed the number of new infections and continues to hit new machines. Also, a second version of WannaCry is just around the corner.

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