E-mail recipients opened the letters and the virus got into the institution webs. Infected work stations downloaded additional files and started sending fake e-mail letters or conducting other malicious activities.
According to National Cyber Security Centre information, such fake letters were received by representatives of the Government, ministries of the Republic of Lithuania, and contacts the National Public Health Centre collaborated with on epidemiological diagnostics.
“Please be warned that computer viruses are not always caught by the security tools organisations use: malicious codes can be circulated in different ways, for example, archived, put under a password that’s given in the e-mail letter. Such letters need to be interacted with: the file has to be opened and unarchived with the password. All administrators of e-mail systems are advised to specify their security protocols and filters,” Director of the National Cyber Security Centre Rytis Rainys says.
E-mail of the National Public Health Centre was temporarily shut down on Tuesday to prevent further circulation of the virus. Its IT staff cooperate with the National Cyber Security Centre and the Core Centre of State Telecommunications to remove the virus and be able to restore the National Public Health Centre e-mail system to operation safely.
This has been the second wave of infected e-mail letter recently detected by the National Cyber Security Centre. In October earlier this year Trojan.Emotet-infected letters were also distributed.
The National Cyber Security Centre reminds users to protect their devices from malicious codes by constantly updating security software, periodically completing full anti-virus check-ups, installing latest updates of their OS and software, and not clicking on suspicious links received by e-mail or found on unreliable websites.
