"Cyber experts have been engaged to fix the systems," a senior police officer said.
The red-coloured 'critical alert' was issued by the Computer Emergency Response Team of India (CERT-In), the nodal agency to combat hacking, phishing and to fortify security-related defences of the Indian Internet domain.
"It has been reported that a new ransomware named as Wannacry is spreading widely. Wannacry encrypts the files on infected Windows systems. This ransomware spreads by using a vulnerability in implementations of server message block (SMB) in Windows systems.
"The ransomware also spreads through malicious attachments to emails," it said.
A cyber ransomware is a type of malicious software that blocks access to a computer system until a sum of money is paid through the online medium.
The cyber sleuths agency advised users to apply patches to their Windows systems in order to prevent its infection and spread.
The CERT-In has suggested some anti-ransonware measures: Check regularly for the integrity of the information stored in the databases, regularly check the contents of backup files of databases for any unauthorised encrypted contents of data records, do not open attachments in unsolicited emails even if they come from people in your contact list and never click on a URL contained in an unsolicited email, even if the link seems benign.
"In cases of genuine (universal resource locators) URLs, close out the email and go to the organisation's website directly through browser," it said.
The most important advisory by the CERT-In stated "individuals or organisations are not encouraged to pay the ransom as this does not guarantee files will be released.
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