Enable windows update, update, reboot: Advise from the hero who halted WannaCry

Hutchins explained that he was having lunch with friends and after he returned home he saw several articles about various UK organisations being hit by the ransomware WannaCry.

He has been called the accidental hero for halting the global spread of WannaCry, the ransomware that hit millions of computers across the country. Marcus Hutchins the 22 year old from south-west England found and inadvertently activated a "kill switch" in the malicious software that wreaked havoc on organisations including the UK's National Health Service on Friday, by registering a specific domain name hidden within the program for just $10.69 or Rs 684.32.

The Guardian while quoting Hutchins said, he spotted the URL, not knowing what it would do at the time. He spoke under his alias of MalwareTech, adding that he did not want to be identified.

Hutchins explained that he was having lunch with friends and after he returned home he saw several articles about various UK organisations being hit by the ransomware WannaCry. I had a bit of a look into that and then I found a sample of the malware behind it, and saw that it was connecting out to a specific domain, which was not registered. So I picked it up not knowing what it did at the time, he said.

He further added, "I will confess that I was unaware registering the domain would stop the malware until after I registered it, so initially it was accidental. So I can only add 'accidentally stopped an international cyber-attack' to my resume."

He however warned that this is not over as yet. The attackers would realise how we stopped it and they will change the code and start it again he said.

He also had a bit of advise for Microsoft users- "Enable Windows update, update and then reboot."

OneIndia News