14 DAY TRIAL // Around 30 Australian companies have fallen victim to ransomware in the past few days. Many of them lost considerable amounts of money because the malicious elements seriously affected their business workflow.
As we’ve learned in the last months, cybercriminals have turned their attention to ransomware to make a profit. While many of these malicious elements only lock up a computer’s screen, there are some versions designed to encrypt the victim’s most sensitive files and hold them for ransom.
According to News.com.au, authorities have received complaints from numerous organizations, including medical centers and businesses from the insurance, clothing and entertainment sector.
As many have learned, the encryption algorithm is nearly impossible to crack, so, in most cases, those who want to recover their files are forced to pay the $3,000 (2,300 EUR) ransom demanded by the crooks, presumably from China.
There are a number of ways in which cybercriminals can place the malware on their victims’ computers. It could be via email attachments, by tricking them into clicking on malicious links, through unpatched security holes, or even by leveraging misconfigured settings of the operating system.
There are some ways to prevent these attacks, or at least their effects. Properly patched up system components and reliable antivirus software could keep you out of trouble.
The implementation of an information security policy for employees is also highly recommended. However, the best way to ensure that a business is not affected by ransomware is to perform regular backups of all the sensitive information.
This way, even if important files are encrypted, they can be restored from a backup copy in a fairly short amount of time.
Also, instead of giving the fraudsters $3,000 (2,300 EUR), organizations could invest the amount in contracting a specialized company that could protect their infrastructures against such threats.