Only backups can stop the Ransomware ‘cancer’ – Bitdefender
A leading anti-malware vendor has stated that only by backing up files will ransomware attacks eventually stop. Bitdefender’s senior e-threat analyst Bogdan Botezatu, in an interview with PCR, says that until the easy rewards of ransomware are made more difficult you can expect these attacks to flourish: “…There’s no cure, it’s prevalent, and it destroys organisations.”
What to do? There are only a few methods we know of to protect yourself:
- Stop the ransomware encryption before it can happen. Run a specific ransomware protection utility or install anti-virus / malware / trojan protection that specifically states it can protect against ransomware. We’re fans of FoolishIT’s CryptoPrevent tool – it’s free, is constantly updated, does not consume memory or CPU resources, and has well over a million downloads to date.
- Backup your files. This is the simplest protection – and is very effective. With known good backups, you can simply restore files over top those that have become encrypted and held hostage.
If we all do our part to deny the ransomware attackers their easy revenue stream, these ransomware attacks will, as Bogdan states, “… will eventually move away from attacking computers”.