Prevention of ransomware is not a straightforward task. Productive ransomware prevention demands a blend of excellent monitoring of applications, persistent file backups, dependable anti-malware software, and employee training.
Whilst no cyber defenses can limit the risk of an attack completely, you can reduce the chance of attackers being successful by following the procedures discussed in this article.
What is Ransomware?
Ransomware is a type of malware that stops you from accessing your device as well as the data stored on it. This tends to encrypt your files.
The cybercriminals who are behind this attack will usually demand a ransom from you in trade for decryption.
During this process, the computer might become locked, or the data stored on it could be converted, hijacked, or erased. It tends to be common for cybercriminals to threaten to leak the data they manage to obtain unless you pay the ransom.
It is not encouraged to meet payment demands as this would be funding criminal groups. Instead, you should take measures to prevent ransomware attacks in the first place.
How to Prevent Ransomware?
To prevent ransomware in the first place, there are some practices you can put in place.
Exercise Good IT Hygiene
Your company must gain full vision over your online environment and digital surfaces. By exercising good IT hygiene, you can gain total network transparency. Once you manage to achieve good hygiene practices, ransomware prevention will come naturally to you and your business.
Strengthen Email Security
Phishing emails are a common method cybercriminals use to gain access to an organization’s data. You will usually find that these emails contain a vindictive link that delivers the ransomware payload to the device of whoever opens it.
To prevent phishing emails from coming through you could implement an email security solution. Alternatively, perhaps companies might wish to educate their employees on being cautious when clicking on links or opening unknown files or attachments.
Organizations could add an external label to any emails that are received from outside of the company, stating a warning message to remind employees that they should be cautious of external messages, links, and attachments.
Harden endpoints
Assure that your systems are constructed with security as a focal point. Secure configuration settings can aid in reducing your company’s threat surface as well as close security gaps that have been left over by default configurations.
Retain up-to-date systems
It is critical that your company’s operating systems, applications, and software are kept up to date regularly. By employing the latest security and updates on your systems you can close security gaps which cybercriminals seek to take advantage of.
If you can turn on auto-updates then this will massively benefit your business because s you’ll automatically have the latest security updates, keeping your systems super protected.
Train your employees
Security awareness training is paramount to prevent ransomware attacks in their tracks. When employees can pick out and dodge malicious emails, the team can all play an important role in protecting the business.
By training your employees you can educate them on what to look out for in emails and online before clicking on dangerous links or attachments.
Implement a zero-trust Regulation
By creating a zero-trust regulation model, users inside and outside the business would be required to be authenticated before being able to grant access to its network and data.
It could be a useful tool to create an identity access management program. This enables IT teams to control access to all systems and applications based on each user’s personal identity.
Maintain backups
Cyber security experts highly recommend backing up essential data because this method is the single most effective way of recovering from a ransomware attack.
When backing up your files they need to be stored offline which will prevent them from being obtained by attackers. On top of this, you need to routinely check backups for efficacy. In the case of an attack, verify that your backups aren’t infected before attempting to access them.
Refine plans & policies
Your business can prevent ransomware attacks by implementing and refining a strong incident response plan so your team knows what to do in response to a ransomware event.
This plan needs to outline defined roles and responsibilities to be carried out during an attack. In addition, a list of contacts such as clients and partnerships needs to be created who would need to be notified about the attack.
Install dependable anti-malware software
Ransomware prevention can be successful through installing the appropriate software. In fact, installing anti-malware software is the most effective way to defend any of your devices against a ransomware attack. iolo’s Malware Killer works by locating and destroying existing malware on your device. By using proprietary technology, the software manages to safely analyze suspicious files through the use of a carefully developed threat-detection algorithm. The malware killer even deploys artificial intelligence to discover the newest ransomware threats. On top of this, it even has the ability to detect previously unknown threats.
The software can be used effectively on all of your at-home PCs, finding and removing dangerous malware from already-infected computers. Its fast detection time is unmatched by quickly monitoring suspicious behavior on your device and putting a stop to threats.
Cybercriminals tend to exploit various attack courses to distribute malware infections. This is where iolo’s Malware Killer is valuable because it has the ability to prevent ransomware attacks from occurring, and can detect previously unknown threats, therefore preventing ransomware overall on your device.
Preventing Ransomware
The key to successfully preventing ransomware attacks starts with implementing good IT hygiene practices within your company. This helps your employees understand the importance of cyber security and keep on the lookout for any potential threats. Once these basic cyber security habits have been learned, you can continue to implement safety strategies to protect your organization. Most importantly, you should be investing in reliable and effective antimalware software that will work around the clock to find and destroy malware on your device.
