Last week’s massive cyber-attack was not as lucrative as the hackers planned

They still made a tidy sum.

It was dubbed "unprecedented" by Europol when hackers began infecting around 200,000 computers on Friday, 12 May. The ransomware, called WannaCry, gave its victims 72 hours to pay around €267 in bitcoin or, if they failed to do so in the allotted time, they would have to pay twice as much. Hackers began a seven-day countdown and, if money was not transferred over within a week, owners would reportedly risk a permanent loss of data on their devices. Elliptic Enterprises Ltd, have confirmed that the hackers have received around €82,000 in bitcoin transactions over the course of the week. The UK-based company tracks the illicit use of bitcoin over the internet and made a live WannaCry tracker available for those who wanted to monitor the progress of the cyberattacks. Also, the company offered support and advice for those who were affected by the attackers, publishing contact forms and help forums on their page. The hackers sent another chilling message the day before the deadline which stated that full payment - using bitcoins - would guarantee full decryption for what they described as "honest customers." Worst affected by the hacking was the Health Service Executive and the National Health Service in the UK, who said it prevented the ransomware from activating but also stated the enryption of their files could cost many lives. FedEx was also hit with the virus and all three organisations initially paid up in the hope that their corrupt machines could be fixed, before the hackers created mass destruction of critical data in the system. Statistics showed that if 1% of the people affected had paid the ransom, WannaCry would have made over €550,000. However, only 0.12% actually paid the hackers.