Reports of "globally coordinated cyber attack" against four industrial sectors in 50 countries. KillDisk becomes ransomware. US Intelligence Community tells Senators Russia hacked the DNC (a full report is promised next week).

Some instructive analysis of this week's interference with google-dot-com-dot-br is out.

Kaspersky Lab reports "a globally coordinated cyber attack" against some 500 companies in 50 countries. The campaign began in August 2016, made extensive use of spearphishing, and appears to have as its object industrial espionage. The targeted sectors are construction, engineering, electrical power distribution, and basic metals.

Bleeping Computer warns that more MongoDB attacks are on the way—may database administrators look to their configurations.

Ransomware gets riskier, more perfidious, and more expensive. KillDisk has been developed into a ransomware package, infecting both Linux and Windows systems. It demands 222 Bitcoin (between $210,000 and $250,000), but apparently doesn't bother restoring the files even after the victim pays up.

The ransomware threat is affecting the security market: MarketsandMarkets predicts a 16.3% compound annual growth rate in the market for ransomware defense, rising from $8.16 billion in 2016 to $17.36 billion in 2021.

Verizon's planned acquisition of Yahoo!'s core assets looks shakier at week's end. The Street quotes a Verizon executive to the effect that the telecom company doesn't want to be "jumping blindly off a cliff."

The US Senate held hearings yesterday on Russian election hacking. US Intelligence Community leaders reaffirmed their conclusions that Russian services successfully targeted the Democratic National Committee. Eyebrows are raised over the FBI's apparent reliance on CrowdStrike's forensics, but such reliance is not really surprising. DNI Clapper promises a full report next week; rumor has it the report will detail how WikiLeaks got DNC emails.