The infamous WannaCry ransomware has finally generated over $100,000 in payments over a week after it first landed, but profits remain relatively low considering the vast number of global users affected by the incident.
The campaign first landed on Friday May 12, with the black hats behind it demanding $300 in Bitcoin from victims in return for the decryption key for their files. That sum doubles to $600 if the ransom isn’t paid within 72-hours.
However, it appears from a Bitcoin tracker set up to monitor the digital wallets tied to the attack, that users are following the advice of security experts and law enforcers.
At the time of writing, the total raised by the cyber-criminals had reached just over $109,000.
This is a minute percentage of the hundreds of thousands of victims said to have been infected around the world.
Europol chief Rob Wainright claimed just two days after the ransomware landed that it had affected more than 200,000 netizens in 150 countries.
Some estimates now claim that figure is closer to 300,000.
Their decision may have been influenced by a few factors; not least getting hold of the digital currency itself and reports that those that paid up had not received their decryption key.
It will also lend weight to the argument that those behind the campaign were nation state hackers rather than financially motivated cyber-criminals, although the North Korea-linked Lazarus Group mentioned by some as potentially involved has previous launching both destructive, disruptive attacks and money-grabbing raids.
WannaCry infections have now dropped to virtually zero, but newer variants are emerging to try and ride on its coat tails, using the same NSA exploits, according to some experts.
There are even attempts to DDoS the kill switch domain registered by UK security expert Marcus Hutchins, aka @MalwareTechBlog, according to reports.