The latest research results show that only 38% of security experts are “very confident” that their company could successfully deal with the increasing ransomware threat.
According to the research, 49% of the 200 conducted security professionals, are to some extent confident that they would be able to recover the damages after a ransomware infection without losing critical data. At the same time, 13% of them admitted they were not confident at all they could do so.
Lately, ransomware has become one of the biggest cyber-threats and it is being employed by hackers searching for fast and easy profit. Unlike CryptoWall and Locky, which are currently dominating the ransomware strain, more and more malware families are appearing, using more advanced infection techniques.
PowerWare is one of the latest threats in this area. It is a piece of macro ransomware which abuses Winows PowerShell in order to conduct its nefarious operations, without writing malicious files to the system. About a month ago, security experts discovered Petya – a new ransomware family which encrypts entire hard drives and modifies the Master Boot Record to prevent users from accessing their data.
Ransomware is targeting both end-users and corporate networks alike, and it has become a business model for cyber criminals. The main problem about it, is that many organizations are not prepared for this fight yet.
The research shows that 73% of the surveyed security professionals view critical infrastructure providers as more vulnerable to ransomware attacks than other organizations. With ransomware using spam and phising emails as one of the main distribution techniques, improper protection against these attack vectors allows cybercriminals continue spreading their malware.
According to the same survey, only 48% of the responding security pros are confident that executives can spot a phishing scam, while 58% revealed that their organization has seen an increase in spear phishing over the past year. 17% of respondents said they were not sure of the increase, and only 25% were confident that it did not happen.
“The decision to pay a ransom comes down to the confidence and financial cost of recreating or restoring data from a previous backup. Since most ransomware samples we have seen have a time limit to pay, it’s important to have confidence you can restore data the majority of data on short notice. Organizations should focus on improving backup and restoration procedures to reduce the cost of restoring data and services after a potential breach,” the senior security researcher Travis Smith stated.
The reality is that ransomware continues targeting bigger organizations every day and some of the most recent spam campaigns, such as the one in Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in February, proves it undoubtedly.
