Ransomware is a growing threat in the world of business, as more and more companies are storing critical data online, and with cloud-based systems. If you’ve been the victim of a ransomware attack, there are certain steps you can take to recover – let’s discuss them here to ensure that your business is back on its feet as soon as possible.
How does ransomware work?
Before you select a quality ransomware recovery software solution, let’s first understand how this type of malware works.
Essentially, ransomware is a small piece of code that infiltrates your system. Once inside, it takes steps to gather critical data across many systems and encrypt this data into a secure file.
After this process is complete, a bad actor will contact you, saying that they will decrypt your data in return for a ransom. There is no guarantee that they’ll decrypt your data after paying the ransom. Therefore, many businesses will leave the hacker to law enforcement and will move ahead with their incident response plan.
How does a company recover from ransomware?
As part of a robust approach to cybersecurity, businesses should have complex and detailed backups of their critical data. This is particularly important during ransomware recovery, as any data that has been stolen should be able to be replaced from a backup somewhere on your system.
Typically, the approach contains three main steps: assess the damage, quarantine infected devices, and restore backup data.
Assess
Backups can also play a crucial role in this phase of an incident response plan: by comparing the data that you have backed up in your system to a current instance of your data, you can spot inconsistencies.
Once you understand how widespread these inconsistencies are, your goal is to determine what is the more recent set of data that is clean and can be used for recovery. During this initial phase, businesses will typically also tend to reach out to law enforcement for advice.
Quarantine
Once you understand what files and physical systems may have been impacted by malware, it’s wise to separate them from the rest of your network. Malware can often be self-sustaining, meaning that a suspicious file may contain code designed to ‘infect’ other files around it.
Restore
Once you have identified your more recent set of clean data, you can start your recovery operations. This is where the type of solution you use will be critical.
A solution with a high granularity in term of restore points—how far apart are your data backups—will ensure you minimize your amount of data loss. Automation and orchestration over your restore process, will translate into a faster recovery time.
If there are any files that you do not have comprehensive backups of, this is the time at which a business should contact any third parties concerned with that data. For instance, you may need to inform a client or investor if their information has been compromised.
Preventing ransomware from being a recurring issue
As the old saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. Since ransomware can be very costly, this certainly rings true: preparing yourself to prevent ransomware is vital.
The best way to defend against further ransomware attacks is to install ransomware detection software, such as real-time encryption detection software, and to monitor access to your systems. On that second point, resetting passwords everywhere can be a simple yet powerful tool to prevent further attacks.
Ransomware attacks can be costly and frustrating for any business. Ensuring that you’re prepared with ransomware recovery software and ransomware detection software is vital.
