Ransomware attacks are getting bigger and better in their scope. Wide-reaching destructions of NotPetya and WannaCry are some recent examples where ransomware attacks have even brought about tensions between countries.
Moreover, a research report indicates that nearly half of the companies were hit by ransomware attacks last year and majority of them were targeted more than once. The research was conducted by a British security software company Sophos on the current state of endpoint security of digital systems. Businesses that got affected by ransomware in 2017 had to spend $133,000 on average to deal with the fallout of these attacks.
According to experts, the availability of ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) is one of the reasons why ransomware attacks are becoming so regular and universal.
Ransomware programs are not run-of-the-mill malware codes. Only highly skilled and experienced cyber criminals can devise an ingenious ransomware attack. Therefore, ransomware activities stay beyond the scope of amateurs. However, RaaS enables all such ambitious cyber criminals who don’t have the prowess to carry out their own ransomware attacks to get the services of third-party developers from the criminal world of dark web. The catch of using RaaS by novices is to get a good sum of money for encryption key from the affected parties to restore ransomware files. Research team at Sophos studied one such ransomware kit available on the dark web for least skilled cyber criminals to work out their ransomware outings on the template of that kit.
Expert cryptovirologists are also exploring new methods to make their ransomware programs undetectable because it will add value to RaaS. For instance, they are now using built-in features such as non-executable malware code to get around the detection from endpoint protection code.
This unannounced collaboration between cyber criminals in the form of RaaS is indicative of the fact that more trouble is yet to come for organisations that are completely reliant on digital systems for their operations. We have already discussed how robots might be the next target of ransomware operators. Similarly, in future owners of smart homes and cars may also need ransomware removal services to get back the control of their valuables.
For assistance on file recovery, please contact MonsterCloud Cyber Security experts for a professional ransomware removal.
