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What is ransomware?
Ransomware is a class of malicious software that uses common encryption algorithms to scramble your files and data to prevent access. Once your files are encrypted, a ransom demand is made that asks for a certain amount of money, usually in an untraceable virtual currency called Bitcoin.
If you want your files back, the message strongly implies that the only way to recover them is to pay the ransom, in exchange for a decryption key.
While this is not always strictly true due to coding and encryption errors, there are ransomware variants that do handle the encryption functions properly, and are, in fact, unbreakable.
Who's vulnerable to ransomware?
2013 - A Swansea, Massachusetts Police Department
2014 - The Dickson County Sheriff's Office, Tennessee
2015 - Swedesboro-Woolwich school district, New Jersey
2016 - Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, Los Angeles, California
2016 - Lincolnshire County, UK
2016 - San Fransisco "Muni" public transit system
2016 - University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
2016 - Circle Sport-Leavine Family Racing, a NASCAR race team
Early 2016 - At least a dozen hospitals in multiple countries
2013-2016 - Police departments in at least 7 US states
These are mostly all organizations that would have full time IT departments, that should have been running backups and monitoring for malware, and they still were infected. A number of them ended up paying the ransom, because backups were too old, or otherwise not useful for recovering data.
Computer users' encounters with ransomware are also growing at an alarming rate, according to some studies: a near 500% increase year over year between March 2015 and March 2016. This problem isn't going away. In fact, there is even one variant that encourages the victim to infect others, in order to get a possibility of free decryption of their own files.
How to protect yourself.
Of course, the best solution to this problem is a good, regular backup. But, most people and businesses don't have good, regular backups.
A C-Box subscription provides such a backup, completely automatic, which is regularly monitored and verified to be working properly.
Your data is the lifeblood of your organization. Customer lists, accounting data, and more are irreplaceable. Don't let a ransomware infection cost you business, reputation, and untold amounts of stress.