> Authorities fixed the issue by installing a pirated version of Flash at 4:30 a.m. the following day.
I'm surprised the time bomb affected them. Adobe publishes a separate build of Flash for China, which doesn't have the time bomb and will continue to be supported until at least 2023.
And even if they are using the non-China version of Flash, they didn't need to install a "pirated" version. The Flash time bomb can be disabled for individual websites using Flash's enterprise management features. This is documented on Adobe's website.
They would still need to find a browser that will load the plugin. Firefox, Chrome, Edge, and Safari no longer even load the plugin. The Firefox ESR branch (Extended Support Release intended for enterprises) is based on Firefox 78 and still loads the Flash plugin. Firefox 78 ESR will continue to receive security patches (for Firefox, not Flash!) until 2021 Q3.
Odd story.