While Europe and major parts of the world are struggling with the latest Petya ransomware attack, the Indian government doesn’t seem to be worried about the cyber attack that much.
The government on Wednesday said it has started proactive measures to keep the country insulated from the latest round of ransomware attacks, adding that so far there was no large-scale impact on India.
We have been taking proactive steps... we have sent out advisories (on the cyber attack and the malware)... India is not much affected at this stage.Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister of Information & Technology
The Indian IT minister speaking at the inauguration of the two-day National Convention on 'Digitalization: Opportunities and Challenges' further added that the government is keeping a close watch on the issue.
“Not Much Affected”– Is it?
Although, the government says that India hasn’t been affected, some Indian servers have reportedly fallen victim to the Petya ransomware attacks.
The Shipping Ministry on Wednesday said operations at one of the container terminals at Mumbai's Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) was impacted due to a global cyber attack.
Also, an employee from food group Mondelez in India also mentioned they were affected by this ransomware and were having technical difficulties with their systems in Mumbai and Delhi.
Companies like Genesis BM, a public relations firm, had to shut down systems in India after their international servers were attacked. They disconnected their machines from the internet immediately after they heard of the attack on European servers.
Also Read: Cyberattack Reaches Asia as New Targets Hit by Ransomware
The reason that India is not among the most affected yet is probably because many firms have completely disconnected their servers from the internet or because they just haven’t reported the attack.
That aside, many companies did upgrade their systems after the Wannacry attacks and hence have probably been spared. Regardless, the Petya ransomware is still spreading and India could see more infections in the coming days.
With inputs from - IANS
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