Minister Rudiantara: 'Ransomware WannaCry' Attacks Old Windows  

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Communications and information Minister Rudiantara said that Indonesia is not the only country attacked by a rmalwareware named 'Ransomware WannaCry' or 'Wanna Decryptor'.

Rudiantara added that the phenomena also caught attention of information and technology authorities across the world.

“It’s happening across the world and Indonesia. The affected sector is public health,” Rudiantara said in a press conference held in Jakarta today.

In Indonesia, Harapan Kita Hospital and Dharmais Hospital are among the targets. Rudiantara explained that Ransomware does not affect all computers or servers, but only those that use Windows operating system.

“The affected computers are those with old Windows, issued in 2008 or earlier. Computers with current operating systems, such as Mac, won’t be affected,” Rudiantara said.

According to Rudiantara, an attack with Ransomware happened on Thursday, May 11, 2017. Ransomware attacks computers by locking victims’ computers and encrypting all files so that they can no longer be accessed.

“Indonesia was attacked yesterday. It’s a little bit late. Dharmais Hospital reported the issue, since they had troubles in accessing encrypted data,” Rudiantara added.

WannaCry attacks computers with windows operating system since it has weakness related to server message block (SMB) run by the computer and can execute commands and spread to other computers in the same network.

Rudiantara called on the public, particularly institutions and offices to create backups and store it in a separate server. Rudiantara also called on ministries and institutions to form a team to response computer/information security incidents.

GHOIDA RAHMAH