I have shared these statistics before, but they warrant a second turn. Ransomware is growing at an alarming rate. We should not turn a blind eye to this threat, nor should we fall into the trap of assuming the IT security community and the media are overreacting. I do not believe ransomware is a fad, no more than the alarm around increased retail breaches was a fad. These are real issues that are alive and well and continuing to propagate. Unfortunately, we are becoming desensitized. It’s just another breach. This is just another version of crypto-evil. Please don’t feed the beast of cyber criminal behavior by losing focus and failing to take these threats seriously.
Yes, there will be another new, flashy threat somewhere down the road that will recapture our attention. This will happen sooner rather than later. But the emergence of a new threat does not make the reality of older threats go away. The good news is that all the precautions we take today and all the training we deliver to end users and all the layers of security we add to our environments will be beneficial today, tomorrow, and long into the future. We need…we are creating a culture and ecosystem of IT security. Don’t give up and please remain vigilant.