Companies Victimized By WannaCry Ransomware Could Be Sued For Negligence

As many as 200,000 computers were infected with the WannaCry Ransomware last week and tech experts are expecting more incidents like it in the coming days. Naturally, someone is going to get in trouble for this massive security failure, but it’s not going to be Microsoft. If anyone is going to be sued, legal experts are saying that it will be the victimized companies.

The ransomware incident did a lot of damage in terms of both operational and financial losses. It’s particularly terrible for shipment companies, car parts manufacturers, and even health service providers that were hit with the worm due to how it affects client firms and customers. If these companies failed to update the security systems of their Microsoft Windows Operating Systems, they could face potential lawsuits, Business Insider reports.

According to Microsoft itself, many of the companies that were infected with WannaCry were either using outdated Windows OS versions or were sticking with Windows XP, which is practically considered a fossil at this point. If these companies are found guilty of being negligent on their security updates, they could be in a lot of trouble. Edelson PC legal expert Christopher Dore says as much to BI.

"Using outdated versions of Windows that are no longer supported raises a lot of questions," Dore explained. "It would arguably be knowingly negligent to let those systems stay in place.”

With regards to the threat of further ransomware attacks, the only real way that they can be prevented would be to patch every single vulnerability that the perpetrators could target with the worm. As PC World notes, it’s not as if paying the ransom is going to guarantee the removal of the ransomware and that they won’t become victims in the future. If anything, it will only encourage the activities of the perpetrators to inflict the same harm on others.