Security researchers are reporting a massive attack today, dubbed “WannaCry”, which has reached 45,000 attacks in 74 countries around the world so far, mostly in Russia. Kaspersky Lab’s Global Research & Analysis reports that the attack is initiated through an SMBv2 remote code execution in Microsoft Windows. “This exploit (codenamed ‘EternalBlue’) has been made available on the internet through the Shadowbrokers dump on April 14th, 2017 and patched by Microsoft on March 14. Unfortunately, it appears that many organizations have not yet installed the patch. ... while unpatched Windows computers exposing their SMB services can be remotely attacked with the ‘EternalBlue’ exploit and infected by the WannaCry ransomware, the lack of existence of this vulnerability doesn’t really prevent the ransomware component from working.”

— “A few hours ago, Spain’s Computer Emergency Response Team CCN-CERT, posted an alert on their site about a massive ransomware attack affecting several Spanish organizations. The alert recommends the installation of updates in the Microsoft March 2017 Security Bulletin as a means of stopping the spread of the attack.” –Kaspersky Lab

— “The National Health Service (NHS) in the U.K. also issued an alert and confirmed infections at 16 medical institutions. We have confirmed additional infections in several additional countries, including Russia, Ukraine, and India.” –Kaspersky Lab

— “The malware used in the attacks encrypts the files and also drops and executes a decryptor tool. The request for $600 in Bitcoin is displayed along with the wallet. It’s interesting that the initial request in this sample is for $600 USD, as the first five payments to that wallet is approximately $300 USD. It suggests that the group is increasing the ransom demands.” –Kaspersky Lab

— “The malware was made available online on 14 April through a dump by a group called Shadow Brokers, which claimed last year to have stolen a cache of “cyber weapons” from the National Security Agency (NSA). At the time, there was skepticism about whether the group was exaggerating the scale of its hack.” –The Guardian

— Trump ordered emergency meeting: Reuters reports that U.S. homeland security adviser was ordered by President Trump, to hold an emergency meeting Friday night “to assess the threat posed by a global computer ransomware attack in at least 150 countries.”

— Update, Monday, May 15 from BBC / Microsoft warns ransomware cyberattack is a wake-up call: “It blamed governments for storing data on software vulnerabilities which could then be accessed by hackers. It says the latest virus exploits a flaw in Microsoft Windows identified by, and stolen from, US intelligence.”

— Clues point to North Korean Nicole Perlroth and David Sanger report in the New York Times / May 15:  ” Intelligence officials and private security experts say that new digital clues point to North Korean-linked hackers as likely suspects in the sweeping ransomware attacks that have crippled computer systems around the world.”