Researchers have discovered a vaccine for the ransomware that crippled organisations around the globe on Tuesday.

According to security experts, creating a read-only file named perfc and placing it inside a computer’s ‘C:\Windows’ folder can stop the attack from happening.

The BBC says the method is “useful”, but only protects the singular computer the file is placed on.

“Even though it will make a machine ‘immune’ it is still a ‘carrier’ to use the biological analogy,” explained Computer Scientist Proffesor Alan Woodward. “It will still act as a platform to spread the ransomware to other machines on the same network.”

Researchers noted that single files could also stop a machine getting infected by a cyberattack, but they can’t find a ‘kill switch’ to prevent the ransomware from crippling computers.

Written by Leah Alger