Ransomware attacks are known as very dangerous, and another one hit a US unit of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) two days ago, on Wednesday. Some of the systems got disrupted, and liquidity occurred in US Treasuries, according to CNN.
However, the US Treasury trades have been successfully cleared. The incident didn’t affect the systems of the head office of the ISBC in Beijing, and neither those of other domestic and overseas units.
A spokesman of the Treasury explained as CNN quotes:
We are aware of the cybersecurity issue and are in regular contact with key financial sector participants, in addition to federal regulators. We continue to monitor the situation.
According to Reuters and the Financial Times, some market participants believe trades going through ICBC got disrupted, thus affecting market liquidity.
Ipek Ozkardeskaya, who is a senior analyst at Swissquote Bank, stated as CNN also quotes:
Of course, the sudden jump in US yields hit appetite in US stocks yesterday,
The US bond auction brought along a lot of volatility, questions, and uncertainty.
For those unaware, ransomware attacks mean that the attacker will lock the data of the victim and demand a ransom in order to release it. Obviously, paying the price that the attacker wants is no guarantee that the victim will see his data again. The best thing to do in such situations is to ask for help from the police.
