Some Western Digital MyBook Live NAS devices have been reset over the cloud and owners’ files made inaccessible. Users around the globe have been affected.
Update: 6 July 2021. Stellar can help with photo recovery from failed WD My Book Live units as this WD.com community thread suggests.
The WD.com community web site has a threads with multiple device owners confirming the disaster. It appears to have been caused by a malware-originated firmware device reset process, distributed on June 23 around 3pm PDT.
The My Book Live NAS devices are local disk storage boxes with Internet access. They were rebranded MyCloud a back in 2014. WD released its final firmware for the Linux-powered My Book systems in 2015.
Users found their passwords were invalid and some were able to access their device — after resetting, via a paper clip inserted into a pinhole on the rear of the device for four seconds and a blank password — but found empty folders.
Western Digital said affected devices had been compromised by malware.
Poster Mister_E asked: “Is it possible WD’s update servers were compromised and a malicious firmware update was posted and pushed to devices?” That seems a possibility.
WD says it is actively investigating and will provide updates when they are available. Until a fix is found, My Book Live devices should be disconnected from internet access. If there is no fix made available to recover the data, then commercial drive recovery services look to be the most practical way for affected users to get some, most, or hopefully all of their data back.
