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China hit hard by WannaCry, issues warning about new wave of ransomware

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BEIJING: China has urged Windows users to protect themselves against a new ransomware virus similar to the WannaCry bug that wreaked havoc worldwide last week.

UIWIX encrypts and renames files through a bug in the Windows operating system, China's National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center (CVERC) warned in a public announcement Wednesday, telling users to install the latest Microsoft update.

The warning comes on the heels of the WannaCry cyber attack, which has hit hundreds of thousands of computers worldwide.

While no UIWIX infections have yet been detected in China, the virus has spread in other countries and prompted a security alert last week from the Danish cyber security company Heimdal Security.

"UIWIX ransomware is picking up where the first WannaCry wave left off, without a kill switch domain and the same self-replicating abilities that enable it to spread fast," the firm said in a statement.

Heimdal cautioned that the new bug could be more powerful than WannaCry due to the absence of a kill switch domain that could contain the virus's distribution.

But other analysts have noted that UIWIX appears to be spreading at a much slower pace.

Global cyber security firm Proofpoint warned on Wednesday about another large-scale, stealthy cyber attack linked to WannaCry called Adylkuzz.

The extent of WannaCry's impact in China remains unclear.

On Sunday, Qihoo 360, one of China's leading suppliers of anti-virus software, said more than 29,000 institutions ranging from government offices to ATMs and hospitals had been "infected" by WannaCry, singling out universities as particularly hard-hit.

But the Education Ministry's China Education and Research Network denied that there had been widespread damage to computer systems, saying only 66 out of 1,600 Chinese universities were affected.

Ms Sarah Larson, a politics and cyber security researcher at the University of New South Wales, told AFP that China's alert about UIWIX may indicate that WannaCry sent the government "reeling". - AFP

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