78% of Organizations Suffer Repeat Ransomware Attacks After Paying
Cybereason found that 78% of organizations who paid a ransom demand were hit by a second ransomware attack, often by the same threat actor
Ransomware encrypts or steals data to disrupt operations and extort victims, making backups, access controls, and incident response essential.
Search across headline titles and summaries.
Background for this topic.
Ransomware is malware used to deny access to systems or data, usually by encrypting files and demanding payment for decryption. Many operations also steal sensitive information and threaten to publish it, so an attack can create both an availability crisis and a privacy or disclosure risk. Initial access may involve phishing, stolen credentials, exposed remote services, or exploitation of unpatched vulnerabilities; attackers may then move through the network before deploying the payload.
Defenses should combine vulnerability management, phishing-resistant authentication where practical, endpoint and network monitoring, and backups that are isolated from routine administrator access and regularly tested for recovery. Organizations should also limit privileges and segment critical systems to reduce the blast radius. An incident requires rapid containment, preservation of forensic evidence, restoration from known-good backups, and assessment of notification, legal, and regulatory obligations. Threat intelligence can help identify relevant criminal infrastructure or tactics, but it does not replace sound access control, patching, detection, and recovery practices.
Cybereason found that 78% of organizations who paid a ransom demand were hit by a second ransomware attack, often by the same threat actor
Researchers warn of a “ransomware free-for-all” after ScreenConnect vulnerability is exploited
Since emerging in May 2023, the group claims to have victimized 77 companies and public institutions
What businesses should know about Operation Cronos and LockBit, one of the largest ransomware takedowns in history
Arctic Wolf found that the median ransomware demand was $600,000 in 2023, a 20% rise on the previous year
UK’s National Crime Agency has led an international operation to disrupt the Lockbit ransomware group