How often are organizations affected by Ransomware?

One of the greatest cyber threats today, Ransomware is a malicious malware devised to encrypt the user’s files in the system. Usually delivered through infected email attachments and corrupt links, the malware locks the data, rendering it inaccessible until a huge amount of ransom is paid to the hackers.

The attacks have caused such dishevelment and havoc, indistinctively targeting every single entity, from government organizations to businesses and corporations as well as individual users. Victims, unfortunately, face the drastic consequences of the attack for a long time as Ransomware recovery requires tremendous effort and resources.

Ransomware attacks are only becoming more advanced and sophisticated in nature as time progresses, with the hackers using the latest techniques and encryption methods. It serves as a highly lucrative business for cybercriminals, who according to recent studies are now demanding almost $13000 per attack!

Proliferating at incredible rates, it is presumptive to say that these attacks are not showing any signs of slowing down in the near future. In fact, the recent findings suggest that a new organization will fall victim to a ransomware attack every 11 seconds, rising from a rate of 14 seconds in 2019. However, it’s difficult to predict the exact frequency of the Ransomware attacks as many victim organizations do not report to the security authorities and law enforcement agencies about the attack and quietly pay the hackers the demanded amount.

Unfortunately, simply knowing about the threat is not enough, and even when drastic measures are taken to prevent the attack, the cybercriminals are able to find loopholes to exploit vulnerabilities in the victim’s system. In recent years, Ransomware attackers have shifted their target to larger enterprises such as healthcare companies, airlines, and financial institutions, who are extremely dependent on their data and cannot afford to lose it, which means that they’ll ultimately be forced to pay high amounts in ransom to regain access to their data at the earliest, rather than approaching security entities for the malware removal. They are hesitant to invest huge sums in Ransomware recovery.

According to another survey, the number of small businesses struck by the attack was around 29%, implying that they are highly susceptible to an attack since they do not have high-security arrangements to thwart the attack and aren’t prepared for the threat therefore, they have to suffer huge losses, and in many cases, are forced to shut down.

The average cost of an attack on businesses was around $133,000 in 2018, even though 77% of the businesses were equipped with cybersecurity, indicating that these powerful and sophisticated attacks are highly arduous to tackle despite the fact that up-to-date software is used.

Recent data indicates that in 2019, more than 200,000 organizations submitted reports of Ransomware attacks, representing a 41% increase from the year earlier.

Every day, there is news about a different organization being affected by Ransomware, which continues to have debilitating effects and crippling business operations. The attacks continue to rise at escalating rates, costing organizations millions of dollars in Ransomware recovery and other losses.