New Delhi May 18 (IANS) Allaying fears that after WannaCrypt ransomware India will be targeted by a cryptocurrency malware attack that quietly but swiftly generates digital cash from machines it has infected the country s cyber security unit on Thursday said India is safe from the Adylkuzz malware.
There are no reports of this Adylkuzz malware from the Indian establishments yet. Users are advised to maintain updated anti-virus software and apply patches to operating systems and applications on regular basis Sanjay Bahl Director General of the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) told IANS.
After facing a massive ransomware attack that exploited a vulnerability in a Microsoft software and hit 150 countries the same Windows vulnerability (MS17-010) was also exploited to spread Adylkuzz by another group of hackers.
According to a report in The Registrar tens of thousands of computers globally have been affected by the Adylkuzz attack that targets machines lets them operate and only slows them down to generate digital cash or Monero cryptocurrency in the background.
Monero -- being popularised by North Korea-linked hackers -- is an open-source cryptocurrency created in April 2014 that focuses on privacy decentralisation and scalability.
It is an alternative to Bitcoin and is being used for trading in drugs stolen credit cards and counterfeit goods.
There is no need to panic as CERT-In publishes regular advisories and vulnerability notes on its website as well as some on Cyber Swachhta Kendra website Bahl added.
--IANS
na/dg
No report yet of global cryptocurrency attack in India: CERT-In
