May 15 (SeeNews) - Romanian car maker Automobile Dacia, a unit of France's Renault, said on Monday it resumed operations in its plant in southern Romania following a cyber attack that affected computers in almost 150 countries on Friday.
"On Monday, May 15 at 7:00, the activity of the Dacia Mioveni industrial platform was resumed as a result of the mobilization and quick response of our teams. All systems of Renault Group Romania operate normally and are secure. After Friday, May 12, the Ransomeware computer virus hit Renault Group, the situation is now under control," Dacia said in a press release.
Following the attack on its information system, on Saturday morning, part of Dacia's industrial activities in Mioveni was temporarily interrupted and workers were sent home.
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A task force was created in the early hours to manage the situation.
"A series of proactive measures were immediately taken, such as the temporary suspension of industrial activity to stop the spread of the virus and protect the Group. This cyber attack took place in different countries, different sectors of activity and companies," Dacia pointed out.
The Ransomware type virus named WannaCry affected the entire Renault Group on Friday. The virus was launched on May 12 and targeted Microsoft Windows operating system, blocking access of users to their own data in exchange for ransom payments in the cryptocurrency bitcoin.
Romania's intelligence service SRI officially confirmed the attack on Saturday and said that various institutions and companies in Romania were affected. SRI also estimated that such attacks will increase significantly in the near future, which makes it imperative to implement a clear and pragmatic legislative framework that establishes specific responsibilities and responsibilities in this area at national level.
With some 14,000 employees, Dacia remained Romania's largest company in terms of turnover, as sales grew to 20.2 billion lei last year compared to 19.16 billion lei in 2015.
Renault bought Romania's Automobile Dacia, an ailing state company at the time, in 1999.
Dacia topped the SeeNews ranking of the biggest companies in Southeast Europe by total revenue in 2015, surpassing Romanian oil and gas firm OMV Petrom.
(1 euro = 4.5443 Romanian lei)
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