US, Russia Looking Into Clues Suggesting North Korea Is Behind Global Cyber Attack

Software companies in the US and Russia have said the North Korea-linked Lazarus Group may be behind a global cyber attack.

Symantec Corp and Kaspersky Lab said yesterday they were looking into clues that may connect the global "ransomware" attack known as WannaCry with programs previously attributed to East Asian country.

The two companies said some code in an earlier version of the WannaCry ransomware - which has encrypted data on hundreds of thousands of computers since Friday and demanded users pay money to regain control of their machines - had also appeared in programmes used by the Lazarus Group.

The North Korean mission to the United Nations was not immediately available for comment.