WannaCry: World cyber attack attributed to North Korea by the NSA

The virus affected 300,000 computers in 150 countries in just a few days. Its goal would have been to return income to the communist regime of Pyongyang, according to the US government agency. "Ridiculous" charges for North Korea.

North Korea to the maneuvers of WannaCry? This is the opinion of the US National Security Agency (NSA). The North Korean dictatorship reportedly supported the global cyber attack in May, affecting 300,000 computers in 150 countries. Among them, the British hospital IT systems, the car manufacturer Renault, or the US parcel delivery company Fedex. Purpose: to generate income for the Pyongyang regime, according to an NSA report distributed internally and revealed by the Washington Post on Wednesday.

WannaCry is a ransom software that combines the functions of malicious software and computer worms. A first. This allowed to lock the files of the pirated users, and to demand a ransom of 300 dollars (275 euros) to recover its data, under penalty of seeing them removed within seven days in the absence of payment. The ransom was requested in bitcoin, a virtual currency supposed to preserve the anonymity of its owners. The pirates would have collected the equivalent of $ 140,000, according to the Washington Post.

A "ridiculous" accusation for North Korea
The NSA has traced the software back to IP addresses located in China ... but "historically used by the RGB," the agency of the North Korean intelligence services. In the aftermath of the cyberattack, the involvement of North Korea was evoked by Neel Nehta, computer scientist at Google. The latter has posted computer codes showing some similarities between the WannaCry virus, and another series of piracy attributed to the communist regime. Expertise confirmed by reports from Symantec and Kaspersky Lab, cybersecurity companies and anti-virus publishers.

The deputy ambassador of North Korea to the United Nations declared on May 19 that it was "ridiculous" to tie his country to the computer virus WannaCry, reported Reuters: "Whenever something strange happens, Stereotyped, the United States and the hostile forces are kicking off a loud anti-DPRK campaign (Democratic People's Republic of Korea). "