Ransomware Facts You Need to Know
After years of making headlines for successfully breaching businesses, hospitals, and government agencies, and causing millions of dollars in losses, this dangerous type of cyberattack continues to wreak havoc worldwide. Ransomware might seem straightforward: it is malware that makes data unavailable to its owner until a ransom is paid. Yet, many misconceptions about ransomware persist, even among tech-savvy individuals. To dispel these misconceptions, let’s dive into some important Ransomware Facts.
If You Pay the Ransom, Will You Get Your Data Back?
Over the past decade, we have increasingly seen that many crooks utilizing ransomware cannot be trusted. Many parties who have paid ransoms have not regained access to their files. Over half of businesses paying ransomware ransoms may never get their data back. This is a critical Ransomware Fact that is often overlooked.
Ransomware Facts: Different Variants Beyond File Encryption
Ransomware blocks access to your files, but there are multiple ways it can do so. The malware may (a) encrypt your files and demand a ransom for the decryption keys, or (b) delete your files, or parts of them, and demand a ransom to restore them.
Attackers may also threaten to destroy or leak stolen data if the ransom is not paid within a certain timeframe.
Other variants of ransomware attacks may prevent you from using a particular connected device. Or may involve a threat that if a ransom is not paid, the criminal will cause connected devices to malfunction.
Ransomware Facts: Increasing Sophistication of Attacks
Many of today’s ransomware strains not only employ advanced anti-detection techniques, but also use sophisticated analysis engines to quietly seek out the most sensitive files within an organization. The ransomware often remains “dormant” until it identifies the files that the organization is most likely willing to pay to recover.
Targeted Attacks Are More Profitable Than Random Ones
Cybercriminals today know that targeted attacks can pay off handsomely (ransomware payments). As such, they may utilize all sorts of social engineering techniques, as well as technical exploits, in order to deliver ransomware into specific, intended targets.
Many attackers research their victims’ financial situations to determine ransom amounts. Even opportunistic ransomware attacks may adjust ransom demands based on victims’ geolocation, charging higher amounts to victims in wealthier countries like the USA, and lower amounts in less-developed countries.
Hardware Can Spread Ransomware
Ransomware Facts also extend to hardware. Poisoned hardware – that is hardware onto which malware or backdoors have been loaded somewhere between the design of the hardware and its delivery into your production environment – can easily spread ransomware.
You could be in for a terrible surprise, for example, if you purchase an innocent-looking off-brand USB-C charger for your laptop, but that particular charger has a chip embedded within it that communicates with your laptop over the USB C port that you thought it uses only for charging, exploits a vulnerability, and infects the device with ransomware. For the same reason and others, you should never use public USB-based chargers for phones and other computing devices.
Ransomware Facts: Why Healthcare Is a Frequent Target
Since early 2016, hospitals have been consistently targeted by ransomware criminals. The life-threatening consequences of losing medical data make healthcare institutions an attractive target for ransomware attacks. This is an important Ransomware Fact to consider in the context of industries that are especially vulnerable.
Schools and Universities Face Ransomware Threats
Despite not always having large amounts of cash on hand, schools, especially universities, are frequent ransomware targets. The potential damage to personal data and academic records makes schools a significant target for cybercriminals. These Ransomware Facts should make educational institutions take ransomware seriously.
Cyber Hygiene and Backups Are Your Best Defense
There is no substitute for practicing proper cyber-hygiene, and doing so is both far more comprehensive and preventative than any other measure in terms of combating ransomware and preventing data leaks.
But, let’s face it—nobody is perfect, and things can still go wrong even if you do practice good cyber-hygiene. So, backup. Often.
Remember to keep backups disconnected from your computer and you’re your networks so that if any ransomware (or other ransomwhere) gets onto your laptop or onto your network it cannot infect the backups.
Ransomware Facts About IoT Devices
Ransomware Facts also point out that smart devices, like connected cameras, can act as gateways for spreading ransomware. Even if these devices do not store sensitive data, they can help propagate malware to other more vulnerable devices.
Ransomware Attacks Are Not Going Away
I have made that statement over and over for half a decade – and, sadly, just as it has proven to be true until not, it is likely to continue to be true for the foreseeable future.
This article is an updated version of cybersecurity expert Joseph Steinberg’s earlier piece, Ransomware: 8 Things That You Must Know.
