Every few days, we see a new headline about organizations becoming target of ransomware. Ransomware is a type of malware, which forces organizations to pay ransom by limiting or preventing their employees from accessing the digital assets (like files and databases) in their possession. A ransomware typically encrypts files on endpoints and file repositories, thus preventing access to the files and then, in order to decrypt the files, demands payment. The ransom prices vary, ranging from a few dollars to thousands of dollars per file – which can run into millions of dollars for a large organization. It is important to note, however, that paying the ransom does not guarantee that users can eventually access the infected system or files.
Users may encounter the ransomware threat through a variety of means. Unwitting users while visiting malicious or compromised websites fall prey to ransomware. It can also arrive as a payload, either dropped or downloaded by other malware. Some ransomware gets delivered as innocuous-looking attachments in emails (spam or otherwise).
Ransomware has become one of the biggest menaces for enterprises – particularly for those with sensitive, proprietary and private data in their possession. Ransomware incidents are likely to cost billions of dollars to enterprises in coming years. In one of our previous posts, we covered a proactive approach to combat ransomware through policy-based comprehensive endpoint data protection that shields the organization from catastrophes of ransomware infection.
One of Vaultize’s large enterprise customers recently fell victim to a ransomware attack. All of a sudden, a few management team members realized that they were unable to access files on their laptops and desktops because the CryptoLocker ransomware trojan had infected their data. Even well-known and fully up-to-date network security, anti-virus and anti-malware solutions in their corporate network had failed to prevent the locking of data. Fortunately, they had Vaultize endpoint data protection - data protection policies were active for all user endpoints and hence all the previous and clean versions of the infected files were available on their Vaultize server. The users were able to quickly restore their files to their clean versions - thus preventing serious financial loss to organization.
Rather than paying ransom to the extortionists, if you have a sound endpoint data protection (backup and recovery) solution like Vaultize, you can recover infected files and resume normal operations in a few seconds. The extortion attempt can be greatly or fully diminished if IT can recover infected files quickly. In addition to protection from ransomware, endpoint backup also protects your corporate data from instances of human error, accidents, hardware failures and any disaster that may otherwise result in complete or partial data loss. Basically, the investment in an endpoint backup and data protection solution is like investing in a “Kidnap and Ransom (K&R)” insurance – popular in the real world.
Vaultize provides a full-featured endpoint data protection solution through policy-based endpoint backup, endpoint encryption and remote wiping. But, Vaultize also goes much beyond a plain laptop/desktop backup. It is designed as a scalable cloud-architected enterprise file security platform for secure file sharing, VPN-free anywhere access and mobile collaboration with built-in digital rights management (DRM) and mobile content management (MCM). It is built ground-up with enterprise control and unmatched end-to-end security to protect data without hampering end-user productivity – even when the users are roaming beyond the corporate perimeter. In addition to enterprise file sync and share (EFSS) or Enterprise-Dropbox (Dropbox Alternative), some of Vaultize’s popular use cases include FTP Replacement, Outlook attachment replacement and Lotus Notes attachment replacement, which help meet compliance and data governance objectives.
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You can also download a 10-user FREE virtual appliance and start using it within a small team.
