Ransomware, the Exploding Cyber Threat

When a cyber threat grows in magnitude by 35 times in one year, and continues to become even more prevalent the next, every organization should pay attention. This is exactly what happened with ransomware. Cyber criminals have targeted organizations from many different industry segments, as well as businesses of virtually every size.

Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) and other kit-like tools have lowered the entry bar for cyber criminals, enabling even novice attackers to be successful against scattered security infrastructures. And monetary technologies like bitcoin make it virtually impossible for law enforcement authorities to track ransom payments. With the exponential growth in ransom paid to ransomware groups, the prospect that this will continue—and at a faster rate—in coming years is great. Recognizing the growing threat, banks are stocking up on bitcoin so their customers can quickly pay cyber criminals to unlock hacked data.