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A major ransomware attack is now underway against multiple industries, including healthcare, according to data security and disaster recovery vendor Barracuda Networks.

However, the extent of the attack in the healthcare sector is not yet clearly known.

“In the last 24 hours, the Barracuda advanced security team has observed about 20 million attempts at a ransomware attack through an email attachment, such as “Payment_201708-6165.7z,” according to Eugene Weiss, leader of the Barracuda Content Intelligence Team. The payment number varies with each attack.

The attack starts with a spoofed email address with the attachment name and number included in the subject line and body of the message. The attachment is a JavaScript file in a 7Zip archive, which Barracuda identifies as a “file-encryption/ransomware” type virus.

read more at healthdatamanagement.com