With all the positive advancements in information technology, the growth of cyber crime has been a notable drawback. Cyber crime refers to committing theft or any other criminal act through the use of computers or any other tech gadget. In the past five years, Ransomware has been a major source of cyber crime activities.
Ransomware is a malicious software that does not allow you to access your files if it takes over your computer. The creator of the software demands ransom (as the name suggests) from the victim, if they want to gain access to their files again. The payments are normally made in non-traceable transactions through a cryptocurrency (normally Bitcoin) to ensure the attacker’s safety. The victims get so confused and scared that they immediately agree to pay the amounts without considering if the hacker will grant them access or will not do it again. The hacker prevents you from accessing the files through encrypting them with a logical key and the decryption key is provided once the payment is made.
There are a lot of ways you can become a victim of a ransomware attack, the most common being a phishing scam i.e. an email that tells you that the attachments are safe to download, and once you download and open them the hacker can gain access to all your files. Other than this a more notorious ransomware type is NotPetya, that takes advantage of security holes without the need to trick you into downloading or opening any files. Sometimes attackers use the identity of a law enforcement agency to get into the victim’s head and scare them because of the presence of pornography or illegally installed software.
The way cyber crime and data hacks have increased recently, companies are paying more and more attention towards cyber security. The basic ways to avoid being a victim of a ransomware attack include:
Protection against data security has become a become major concern and companies are investing heavily especially after the data breaches at Equifax and Yahoo. These breaches have put companies on red alert, and their cyber security teams are ready for all kinds of attacks.
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