Data Security & Compliance Blog

Ransomware attacks on both national and local authorities are on the rise, according to a recent report by Recorded Future. During the first quarter of 2019, there have been 21 reported attacks on Government agencies in the US – a number that is likely to rise as not all ransomware attacks are reported immediately. Only yesterday, Texas suffered a ransomware attack which affected 22 cities and towns. As opposed to … Read more

Over the last 12 months, we have seen a large number of cities in the USA become the victim of sophisticated ransomware attacks, including New York, Washington, Atlanta, Maryland and more. Baltimore, the most recent victim in this wave of ransomware attacks, experienced their second attack in the last 12 months. Thousands of computers in Baltimore’s city government were completely frozen on the 7th May 2019 after criminals got their … Read more

Well, let’s start with the good news. Overall, both Ransomware and Cryptojacking saw a noticeable decline during 2018. The not-so-good news is that Ransomware is still a growing threat to enterprises, who saw a 12% increase in attacks compared to the previous year. Additionally, 2018 saw an 30% increase in the number of mobile Ransomware infections – most of which affecting devices in the United States. There was, however, an … Read more

A strain of ransomware called SamSam was released towards the end of 2015 and continues to pose a serious threat to organizations of all sizes. Unlike other forms of ransomware, SamSam is very targeted and frequently updated in order to circumvent anti-virus tools and endpoint protection solutions. SamSam is even able to delete backups – one of our primary safeguards against ransomware attacks. Victims are requested to pay the ransom … Read more

Towards the end of last year, cyber-attacks that apparently bore the distinct signature of Ryuk ransomware struck numerous major news corporations, including the Los Angeles Times and Tribune Publishing. Cyber-attackers don’t take time off for the holidays like the rest of us! In the case of the Union-Tribune, it was reported that sports editors initially noticed that they were unable to transmit their finished pages to the printing facility. The … Read more

Ransomware remains a formidable threat to organizations worldwide. According to a recent survey conducted by Bitdefender, 75% of respondents experienced up to 5 attacks in the last 12 months alone, and organizations accounted for 42% of all ransomware infections. Though cyber-criminals have always targeted Microsoft products, the rapid growth in the popularity of Office 365 has made it a #1 target for ransomware attacks. Cerber, a recent strain of ransomware, … Read more

Though ransomware is slowly being replaced by Cryptojacking as the most popular form of malware, ransomware is still a formidable threat, with even more variants – targeting even more devices and industries. According to the following infographic, “every 40 seconds a company is hit with ransomware”, with 71% of those companies getting infected. Below are some pointers that can help companies prevent, detect, and recover from a ransomware attack. Prevention … Read more

Cryptojacking is a relatively new technique which enables cyber-criminals to illegally “mine” cryptocurrencies on both vulnerable web servers and unsuspecting users’ devices. Cryptocurrency mining is the process by which cryptocurrency “coins” are created. In simple terms, miners use computational resources to perform calculations, which involve iterating through billions of random inputs, until a desired output is achieved. Of course, it’s a lot more complicated than that, but an explanation about … Read more

When considering the costs associated with a ransomware attack, we tend to assume that the greatest expense is paying the actual ransom. However, this isn’t necessarily the case. There are a number of hidden costs relating to things like forensic investigations, restoring backups, down-time, damage to reputation, lawsuits and fines. It should be noted that it’s generally not a good idea to pay the ransom. After all, there’s no guarantee … Read more

The infamous WannaCry ransomware attack of May 2017, which infected more than 300,000 devices across 150 countries, is still regarded as the most prolific of its kind. Hospitals in the UK were temporarily shut down. Ambulances were diverted, surgeries were cancelled, and appointments were postponed. Yet, despite the widespread damage that was caused by WannaCry, it was by no means the most profitable, nor was it the most sophisticated type … Read more