Local Official addresses Ransomware as Emerging ‘Troubling Trend’

Photo by Miranda Pederson, Bowling Green Daily News

Photo by Miranda Pederson, Bowling Green Daily News

Yesterday Kentucky Office of Homeland Security Executive Director John Holiday identified cyber-ransom as being one of today’s largest safety threats. Holiday’s comment came during Wednesday’s Rotary Club meeting when he spoke about various recent security breaches and how his department is focusing narrowly on this issue.

Referred to as online extortion by Holiday during his address, here at ABR we’ve explored this idea under the umbrella of ransomware.  Or in simpler terms, the modern digital hostage. Hackers tap into information, take it ransom, encrypt it then require the original owner to pay a certain amount in exchange for a decrypting code.

Holiday shared that he was recently involved in an information breach case involving about a dozen Eastern Kentucky hospitals.

“A troubling trend is that is happening out there is a lot of these businesses are actually paying the ransoms to get all their information back,” Holiday said. “There’s no guarantee they’ll get that information back . . . so we have to develop new processes and a way to figure out how to deal with that asymmetric threat.”

Holiday concluded his address by encouraging the audience to immediately report any noticed suspicious behavior or activity to his department.

Call your IT consultant in Bowling Green, and take that next step in strengthening your computer network support system. Your ABR network consultant in Bowling Green will guide you through selecting the appropriate anti-malware software for your business and assist in communicating the importance of cautious internet use to your employees.

Call ABR Systems Group for more details. Our small business IT support in Bowling Green, Ky. is here to help.

 

To view the original Daily News article, click here.