The largest non-windows ransomware attack on record took place over the weekend, with thousands of computer servers taken offline by a targeted attack.

A number of agencies including the French Computer Emergency Response Team and Italy’s national cybersecurity authority (ACN) highlighted that thousands of VMware ESXI servers are vulnerable to the attack which has impacted organisations in France, Finland, Italy, Canada and the US.

In a statement, the Italian government said that the attack was likely the work of criminal hackers rather than being a state-sponsored attack. It said “No evidence has emerged pointing to aggression by a state or hostile state-like entity.”

This attack targets VMware ESXI servers, exploiting a known vulnerability which was identified and patched in February 2021. VMware has urged its customers to update their systems to the latest patch version to mitigate the threat.

VMware is currently the subject of a $61 billion takeover bid from US chipmaker Broadcom. Last week, the UK’s competitions watchdog – the Competitions and Markets Authority (CMA) – launched an investigation into the deal to gauge whether it could substantially hurt competition in the country. The EU’s antitrust regulators meanwhile have paused their investigation, with Broadcom yet to provide requested data.

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