The CyberEdge’s annual Cyberthreat Defense Report reported that in 2023, ransomware attacks were experienced by nearly three-quarters of businesses across the globe, following a five-year upward trend that shows no sign of slowing. This figure (72%) represents the highest reported percentage ever. While any business is vulnerable to ransomware, the business sector took the brunt of the activity in 2023, with construction, government, and media sectors in the crosshairs.

ransomware threat

Before demanding ransom, cybercriminals must breach the victims’ systems and infect them with malicious software. One prolific technique is double extortion, when attackers encrypt and lock up the victim’s data but also threaten to leak it if the ransom demand is not paid. Another technique targets supply chain vulnerabilities to access a more extensive network. Regardless of the technique or method used, all businesses must learn to protect themselves more effectively.

In this article, we discuss five proactive measures companies can take to safeguard their business against the rising threat of ransomware attacks.

  1. Employee Awareness Training: Human mistakes cause a significant number of data breaches, and employees are often responsible. According to Verizon’s Data Breach Report 2023, 74% of all breaches involve a human element, whether human error or susceptibility to falling for phishing-type attacks. Security awareness education is critical for protection against ransomware. Training raises employee awareness of phishing threats or suspicious download links, allowing them to identify and respond to potential threats more effectively.
  2. Multi-Factor Authentication: Establishing multi-factor authentication (MFA) is critical in protecting an organization against ransomware attacks. MFA elevates security by requiring users to provide multiple verification forms, such as a laptop login code sent to a different device, like an associated smartphone. Fingerprints and facial recognition are the latest versions of these MFA technologies. This multi-layered approach makes it more difficult for criminals to achieve unauthorized access, even if a password is compromised.
  3. Incident Response (IR) and Recovery Plan: An IR and recovery plan should include a means of incident detection and identification, steps to respond to and eradicate the threat, and how staff will restore the systems after an incident. All IR and recovery plans should be routinely tested, validated, and adapted as necessary. In this way, a company can identify weaknesses and offer targeted training to ensure employee readiness.
  4. Consolidated Monitoring and Security Tools: Cyber criminals do not keep bankers’ hours, and attacks can occur anytime, day or night. The necessity for 24 x7 monitoring is evident, as it is one of a few strategies that limit hackers when exploiting vulnerabilities. Considering the seriousness of the threat landscape, companies often purchase and integrate different and disconnected security tools to safeguard their digital assets – but those tools rarely offer a unified, real-time overview of corporate defenses, meaning that security personnel is forced to monitor multiple consoles and correlate all the data manually. Consolidating these tools into one platform can achieve continuous security monitoring, improved threat detection and response, and ultimately, a reduced risk of cyberattacks and security incidents.
  5. Continuous External Risk Assessment: External risk assessment provides for the monitoring of all vulnerable online digital assets to instantly identify potential threats. Companies should look to analyze non-compliant passwords, compromised user identities, unexpected dark web presence, and more. External risk analysis can be affected manually, but tools exist to search for items of concern.

In 2024, ransomware is expected to remain a prolific threat. Companies across the globe are making ever-increasing investments in robust protection measures to protect their critical data and operations. Cybercriminals are ever-evolving, and ransomware-as-a-service ensures that they aren’t slowing down. While the above recommendations are vital, comprehensive protection will require strategic planning.

If your company wants to start 2024 knowing you have a comprehensive protection plan against ransomware, call Alliance IT today. We help Sarasota SMBs to grow and thrive in a competitive, evolving, and sometimes hostile environment.