Organizations are counting unbearable losses as ransomware attacks increase. According to the Cybereason survey, more than 12000 cybersecurity leaders have been victims. The report further reveals that cyber insurance does not cover the costs for these incidents. And cases of CISOs exist are making the fight against these attacks more challenging. But what are the best ways to solve all these?
Professional Insight on the Ransomware Attack
An essential tool in fighting ransomware attacks is knowing how the gangs operate. Otherwise, it will be challenging to determine the best way of addressing this. This is true, especially with the common trend of recurring attacks using similar tactics. So, every company should seal all the loopholes that lead to an attack in the first place. When an organization fails to seal points of intrusion, the attacks will reoccur.
It is also worthwhile noting that the attackers change their strategies often. The techniques used in ransomware attacks have evolved over the years. For instance, at the start of 2018, ransomware dropped as first-stage campaigns. Security tools like threat detection and encryption were used to deter these attacks. Consequently, new methods evolved, and the case even got worse. More human-operated attacks came along, and this thwarted the cybersecurity efforts further.
Today, ransomware attacks involve using banking Trojan—a method the attackers use to deploy malware to their victims. In most cases, they target vulnerable software and insecure remote access. Ideally, these are areas most organizations fail to address. And these are just the critical areas exposing organizations’ shortcomings in this war.
The Consequences of Ransomware Attacks
Ransomware attacks come with unmeasurable consequences. The many organizations that have been victims can best count permanent losses. For one, a single attack can bring extensive shakeups to a company. Most respondents to the survey agreed that they had to lay off employees after an attack. Industries in the automotive, retail and legal sectors experienced major job eliminations. But the government, to some extent, reported nearly no effect.
CISOs, in particular, have been affected the most. Many are these professionals who end up losing their jobs after a ransomware attack. Fortunately, they usually get hired sooner due to the shortage of experienced experts.
Even still, the effects of ransomware attacks on organizations can never go unnoticed. Most of the respondents who paid ransom said they got their data back. To some extent, the data came corrupted, and in rare cases, everything was intact. The other challenge is that it is impossible to tell if all the data is intact after paying the ransom. So, this means ransomware attack leaves the victims vulnerable in every measure.
Final Words
No single option is available to solve ransomware attacks. Insurance and backups are the top solutions organizations can count on. It is also true that paying the ransom may be the only way to save an organization after an attack. But how the company seals the first-case point of entry is what will make the difference.