The cyber attacks that swept the globe on Friday likely aren’t over just yet: current data show more than 1.3m computer systems are still vulnerable to infection to the debilitating WannaCry infection.
So far, 200,000 computers across 150 countries are known to have been infected in the first wave of the WannaCry cyber attack, Europol said on Sunday. “The recent attack is at an unprecedented level and will require a complex international investigation to identify the culprits,” the European police agency added.
Intelligence agencies in Europe and the US have spent the weekend warning large companies and organisations that the threat from the ransomware — a category of malicious software that encrypts infected machines’ hard drives and demands payment to release the data again — may escalate.
In Asia Pacific equities, futures tip Sydney’s S&P/ASX 200 to gain 0.1 per cent at the open, while Tokyo’s Topix is expected to shed 0.3 per cent and the Hang Seng is set to rise 0.5 per cent when trading begins in Hong Kong.
Corporate earnings reports out today include NTT, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, Asahi Group, Mizuho Financial, Japan Post Bank, Japan Post Holdings, SMFG and Dai-ichi Life.
The economic calendar for Monday is kicking the week off with a bang (all times Hong Kong):
- 07.50: Japan producer price index
- 09.30: Australia home loans
- 10.00: China industrial production, retail sales and fixed asset investment
- 10.30: Thailand Q1 GDP
- 14.00: Japan machine tool orders (preliminary)
