The US Justice Department is ready to hold hackers from North Korea accountable for the May 2017 global WannaCry ransomware attack and the cyberattack on Sony Corp that took place in 2014, Reuters reported, citing a US official.
The Justice Department's charges comply with a US governmental strategy that seeks to name and shame the alleged offenders in order to prevent cyberattacks in the future.
READ MORE: Seoul Accuses N Korean Hackers of Stealing Cryptocurrency Worth Billions
The WannaCry ransomware attack took place in May 2017 and infected hundreds of thousands of computers globally, even crippling parts of the UK's National Health Service.
US White House Homeland security and counterterrorism adviser Tom Bossert accused Pyongyang of the cyberattack, while Facebook said it had deleted accounts operated by a hacking group affiliated with North Korea.
Following the accusations, last year, the North Korean ambassador to the United Nations had called on Washington to reveal evidence showing that Pyongyang was behind the WannaCry ransomware attack, as it claimed.
