Typewriters bail out cyber attack victims in Alaska
Washington: When a cyber attack crippled-computer networks in the US state of Alaska, officials happened upon an old-fashioned -solution: typewriters.
Government workers in Matanuska-Susitna are now using them to carry out their daily tasks after they found their computers held hostage to-ransomware. The malware encrypted the borough's email server, internal systems and disaster recovery servers, a spokesman said.
Staff had "resourcefully" resorted to typewriters and were writing receipts by hand while officials rebuild their computer systems.
Ransomware is a malicious software that allows hackers to demand -payment in exchange for restoring computer services. Last May, tbritain's national Health Service was hit by a ransomware that crippled services and affected computers in around 150 countries.
The borough of Matanuska-Susitna, part of the Anchorage metropolitan area, said almost all of its 500 desktop computers and 120 of its servers were affected. Telephone systems, a door entry card system and the network's backup data were also hit, according to Eric Wyatt, its IT director. The attack spread on July 24, while officials -believe the malware may have entered its systems in May.
Mr Wyatt said anti-virus software had spotted one part of the virus on July 17 but failed to detect all the-components of the malware.
"Though it initially appeared that our data was a complete loss, we have recently recovered data from the shared drives," he said. "Email does appear to be completely unrecoverable."
Telegraph, London