Ukrainian Police Seize Servers Of Firm Linked To Global Cyberattack

Ukraine’s Interior Ministry says its cybercrime police department has prevented the second stage of a global cyberattack by seizing the servers of a small company.

Authorities on July 4 seized servers belonging to Intellect Service, the software developer of the Kyiv-based tax software firm M.E. Doc.

M.E. Doc was at the center of last week’s global outbreak of malicious software.

Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said the servers of the M.E. Doc system in Kyiv had begun sending out and activating a computer virus at 1:40 p.m. local time on July 4.

Avakov said the attack was due to reach its peak at 4 p.m., but he said authorities stopped the attack before 3 p.m.

M.E. Doc was identified as "patient zero" of last week’s outbreak, which crippled computers at several multinational firms and knocked out cash machines, gas stations, and bank branches in Ukraine before spreading to other countries.

The company denies allegations that poor security helped seed the malware epidemic.

M.E. Doc is used by 80 percent of the companies in Ukraine to file taxes.

Based on reporting by AP, Reuters, and Interfax-Ukraine