Italy warns of global cyberattack, asks organisations to protect their systems – Times of India

Thousands of computer servers globally have been targeted by a ransomware attack, Italy’s National Cybersecurity Agency (ACN) has said, advising organisations to take action to protect their systems. The hacking attack targeted VMware ESXi servers, the agency said. The news comes as countries are seeing an increasing number of cyberattacks.
Citing ACN director general Roberto Baldoni, news agency Reuters reported that the attack sought to exploit a software vulnerability on a massive scale. As per Italy’s ANSA news agency, servers had also been compromised in other European countries such as France and Finland as well as countries including the US and Canada.

Organisations locked out of systems
As per multiple reports, dozens of Italian organisations are likely to have been affected and several more have been warned to take action to avoid being locked out of their systems.
Meanwhile, US cybersecurity officials said they are assessing the impact of the reported incidents. “CISA is working with our public and private sector partners to assess the impacts of these reported incidents and provide assistance where needed,” the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency was quoted as saying.
Meanwhile, a VMware spokesperson was cited as saying that the software firm is aware of the report and it issued patches of the vulnerability that is now being exploited, in February 2021. It urged the customers to apply the patch if they have not done so.

Vulnerability not completely fixed
News publication Politico quotes ACN as saying that these types of servers had been targeted by hackers in the past due to their vulnerability. “However, this vulnerability of the server was not completely fixed, leaving an open door to hackers for new attacks.”
Notably, France was the first country to detect the attack, ANSA said. It is estimated that thousands of computer servers have been compromised around the world, and the number is reported to increase.