Businesses in the Middle East are bracing themselves for the possible spread of the Bad Rabbit strain of malware from Eastern Europe.
Bad Rabbit is working its way through Russia and the Ukraine but it is feared it will soon spread further afield.
Chester Wisniewski, principal research scientist, Sophos, said: “It was only a matter of time before someone took the ideas from WannaCry and NotPetya and ran with them for another go at unsuspecting victims.
“It appears this latest variation, the so-called Bad Rabbit ransomware, is being distributed via a fake Adobe Flash Player installer file. Initial reports are primarily from Eastern Europe, especially focused on Russia and Ukraine.
“What makes this malware more dangerous than your typical ransomware (being distributed in a similar manner) is its ability to spread across an organisation as a worm and not just through email attachments or vulnerable web plugins.
“It is rumoured to contain the same password stealing and spreading mechanism as NotPetya, allowing it to traverse an enterprise and cripple it in no time.”
Mimecast have also issued a warning about the possible consequences of the latest strain of malware.
Steven Malone, Director of Security Product Management, Mimecast, said: “Ransomware season is open again as yet another new strain, dubbed Bad Rabbit, is reported to be spreading fast.
“Initial analysis shows this to be another variant of ExPetr/Petya, the malware that affected businesses globally just a few months ago and which uses the same SMB flaws to spread laterally once inside a network.
“As businesses in Russia and Ukraine report infections, global companies must look inward and ask themselves – ‘Have I done enough? Did we patch our systems after Petya? Have we shored up our perimeter web and email defences?’
“History tells us the answer to these questions is very likely no, so once again, brace for further widespread outbreaks”
