Can globalization survive a barrage of cyber attacks?

How a truly bad global cyber attack could inspire a global shift towards isolationism

Global cyberattacks.
(Image credit: iStock)

The biggest cyber attack the world has ever seen went down on Friday.

The malware — built off a worm called "WannaCry" — infected computers using a phishing scam, locked the systems down, and demanded $300 in bitcoins in exchange for letting users back into their own files and computers. By Sunday, the cyber attack had hit over 200,000 computers in 150 countries, and "aftershock" infections were still popping up. The previous attack anywhere near this big was a decade ago, when a computer worm called Conficker struck millions of computers across 190 countries.

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Jeff Spross

Jeff Spross was the economics and business correspondent at TheWeek.com. He was previously a reporter at ThinkProgress.