Global cyber attack likely cover for covert malware installation: Ukraine police official

KIEV (Reuters) - The sophisticated computer virus that spread from Ukraine across the world this week was highly likely a cover for installing new malware in Ukrainian computers, a top Ukrainian police official told Reuters on Thursday.

"Since the virus was modified to encrypt all data and make decryption impossible, the likelihood of it being done to install new malware is high," the official, who declined to be identified, wrote in a phone text message.

The virus wreaked havoc on firms around the globe as it spread to more than 60 countries, disrupting ports from Mumbai to Los Angeles and halting work at a chocolate factory in Australia.

(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; writing by Matthias Williams; editing by Andrew Roche)