This Week's Ransomware Roundup

1) I was going to write up all the ransomware related news and then ran across this article by Senior Editor Sara Peters at Darkreading. Saves me some time! She started out with: "Inventive new variants and damaging attacks swept through the headlines this week." She is so right, and covers:

- Israeli Electric Authority infected with ransomware
- Lincolnshire County Council phished and 300 machines down
- CryptoWall 4.0 sends spoofed SalesForce emails with fake invoices
- New strain of Android ransomware that poses as a pr0n app
- The new stupid and destructive 7ev3n ransomware strain wanting 5 grand

We reccomend reading Sara's full article over at Darkreading.

2) Tripwire came up with literally 22 ways to make sure ransomware does not make it into your systems. Obviously way at the top -- number 4 to be precise -- he states you need to train employees, but there are many other ways to prevent infections. I'm not going to repeat all of them here, of course backups are at the top but you should check out all of their tips to make sure your users and your network are protected.

Anti Ransomware 3) And while we are talking preventing ransomware tips, here is #23. Malwarebytes just released a Beta of their Anti-Ransomware tool which sounds promising as well. It uses proactive technology to monitor what new strains of ransomware are doing You can create an additional layer of security as your first line of defense: your users that get effective security awareness training.