Cybersecurity

Ransomware: The key lesson Maersk learned from battling the NotPetya attack

Speaking in a keynote session at CYBER UK 19 – a cybersecurity conference hosted by the UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) – Woodcock was reliving the events of 27 June 2017 when the shipping and logistics giant Maersk was an unintended victim of NotPetya ransomware.

Developed as a disk-wiping cyber weapon by the Russian military and helped along by a leaked version of the NSA's EternalBlue hacking tool – which is the same exploit that powered the WannaCry ransomware outbreak, NotPetya's target was businesses in Ukraine – but the malware quickly got out of hand. Soon it was spreading around the world, taking down networks and causing billions of dollars in damage and lost revenue.

Headquartered in Denmark with hundreds of sites in countries across the globe, Maersk plays a huge role in global shipping, with one of its massive ships – each carrying up to 20,000 containers – arriving in a port somewhere around the world every 15 minutes.