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Ransomware is getting worse, in almost every way.
Between the increasing number and sophistication of attacks and the ever-increasing financial burden they impose on state and local governments, the impact is immense.
Ransomware attacks increased by as much as 78% between 2020 and 2021, and 68% of organizations were affected by ransomware in the past year, according to Sophos’ The State of Ransomware 2022 report. to the global survey of 5600 IT professionals, which included respondents from the public sector.
In addition, the attackers have demanded more ransom, especially from those who believe they can pay at most, such as production or application companies. Attackers focusing on physical care and state and local governments demanded the lowest payments, yet victims in those sectors were more likely to pay, according to the report.
The highest pay rates, which soared about 50%, were observed from kindergarten through grade 12, state/local government, and health care. incident via crisis and planning, according to Sophos.
On the plus side, organizations recover after an attack. Today, almost all recover encrypted knowledge: almost three-quarters recover knowledge from backups, but almost a part pays the ransom to repair the knowledge.
Cyber insurance was used to pay almost all (98%) of the ransoms. Even when a ransom is paid, victims do not regain all their knowledge. For state and local governments, only 59% of encrypted knowledge has been unlocked.
To make matters worse, cyber insurance is becoming more expensive and difficult to obtain. One county recently received a million-dollar policy that covers costs related to credit monitoring, ransom payments and formula restoration. Last year, it received $2 million in the policy for part of the cost.
“It’s worth remembering that while cyber insurance will help you get back to your previous state, it doesn’t cover ‘improvement,’ that is, when you want to invest in better technologies and address the weaknesses that led to the attack. “the above-mentioned report.
Baltimore has the ransomware response poster. When an attack destroyed the city’s facilities in May 2019, the city refused to pay the $76,000 in bitcoin demanded by the attackers. Some facilities were disrupted for months and the city eventually spent $10 million on computers. recovery, according to documents received through Technical. ly. A November 2020 ransomware attack on Baltimore County public schools still affects 9,000 retirees, the Washington Post reported, even though the county paid only about $10 million for recovery facilities.
Ransomware attacks are becoming easier for cybercriminals to launch, thanks to attack-as-a-service components, making the likelihood of an attack even greater. knowledge to be returned.
“We would possibly have peaked in the evolving ransomware journey, where attackers’ greed for ever-higher ransom bills collides head-on with a cyber insurance market that hardens as insurers seek to lessen their threat and exposure to ransomware,” Chester said. . Wisniewski, principal investigator at Sophos.
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