5 Lessons Organizations Can Learn from the Worst Data Breaches of 2020

While data breaches are invariably costly for organizations, the fallout from a data breach isn’t always the same. There are numerous motivations for threat actors and an even greater number of strategies that they employ to achieve their varied goals. As such, it falls to security professionals can continuously learn from the ongoing cyberattacks the best ways to predict and prevent cyber breaches in a constantly evolving threat landscape.

In this article, we take a look at 5 of the lessons that can be learnt from some of the biggest cyberattacks of 2020.

1. 3rd party integrations create new attack surfaces

The recent breach of SolarWinds allowed foreign agents to access and spread malware to numerous government agencies and high-value US targets. These threat actors knew they could likely never penetrate these targets directly, and instead discovered they all used the same software for network management - SolarWinds. 

The attack spread a malware which lay unnoticed in the system for months as the attackers are believed to have observed and gathered data on their targets.

The key take away from this hack is that no matter how excellent and strict your own system’s security is, if the 3rd party systems you use have a weakness, then so do you. This is especially important as systems become increasingly interconnected, with a myriad of moving parts provided by dozens of different vendors. 

While you can’t and shouldn’t simply wall of your systems with a trust no-one approach, organizations also mustn’t take third-party solution provider’s security for granted. Conduct rigorous, ongoing security audits of your systems to be sure there’s not a nasty surprise hiding around the corner.

2. You need clarity across your organization’s security

As an organization grows in size and complexity, often, as we mentioned above, integrating and employing 3rd party vendors, the number of attack surfaces grows too. Organizations need systems in place to maintain clarity over the entirety of their IT security.

In July, Garmin was locked out of its own systems by ransomware and ended up having to pay millions in ransom for the decryption key. 

Garmin faced an impossible situation. While law enforcement officials and cybersecurity experts repeatedly warn companies not to pay ransomware attackers as it encourages further ransomware attacks, companies like Garmin are often left with no other choice. 

As such, companies need to employ systems, security protocols, and training to prevent ransomware.

For businesses like this, it’s vital to have systems in place to maintain a vigilant security posture toward every possible vector for attack.

3. Humans are the weakest link

Social engineering tactics can range from rather obvious emails from Nigerian princes to complex multi-step and highly targeted spear-phishing campaigns. In late 2020 the latter is what happened to Twitter, with numerous employees targeted with a strikingly elaborate spear-phishing campaign. The strategy involved multiple steps including tricking an employees phone carrier, pretending to be a member of the I.T. team, and creating fake login pages.

Once they had an employees admin account login they hijacked multiple high profile Twitter accounts and launched a Bitcoin scam that saw them making off with over $100,000 in less than an hour before it was stopped. Though this attack certainly could have been worse, it shows how one of a companies biggest vulnerabilities is compromised employee credentials. 

There are a couple of things that can be done to protect against employee weakness in your security defences. These include restricting employee access to sensitive data. Ensuring you offboard, and remove access to systems for old employees, implementing strong authentication protocols such as multi-factor authentication, and regular security training sessions for staff 

4. Only store data vital to providing your service

In July of 2020 GEDMatch, a DNA genealogy site was hacked. The hackers changed the user’s privacy settings - opting everyone in to share their data with law enforcement. The hack exposed the data of around 1.4 million people.

Thankfully, GEDMatch later announced that no raw DNA files had been compromised as no raw data is stored on the site. Instead, the data is encoded when it’s uploaded and the raw file deleted immediately. The key lesson here is that GEDMatch followed good practice, not storing any sensitive raw data and thus eliminating a potentially serious attack vector meaning the failure of one control did not lead to the attackers progressing beyond their initial intrusion.

If you can avoid storing highly sensitive data — such as passwords, payment information, or biometric data — on your own servers, do so. Deleting raw DNA data helped minimize the damage to GEDMatch in this breach.

5. People aren’t going to stop reusing passwords

The majority of people on the internet don’t know the best online security practices and many reuse the same tired old password across numerous websites. This has lead to a rise in popularity of one of the most common attack strategies employed by threat actors, credential stuffing. This is when they buy large datasets of login details, eg. passwords and user names, and apply them to other sites. While the strike rate is generally quite low, this strategy of credential stuffing does work. This is what happened to several insurance companies in 2020 including Independence Blue Cross. 

Independence Blue Cross reported that their member portals had been improperly accessed by hackers reusing credentials stolen from MyFitnessPal in an attack from 2018.

People aren’t going to stop reusing passwords anytime soon, but businesses can still guard against credential stuffing. One crucial step is to implement strong authentication protocols such as multi-factor authentication or adaptive authentication, which asks users for more credentials if their behavior is suspicious. In this case, it could have noticed that members were logging in with new I.P. addresses or at an unusual time of day, and asked them to confirm their identity.

Final Words

Organizations are increasingly connected online, using a myriad of integrations and tools to create better, more user-friendly solutions. Additionally, as we all become more technologically literate and engage more and more online there is an increasing amount of users data stored on organizational systems.

This means that the number of attack surfaces that organizations have to be aware of is continuously growing, and so too are the opportunities for attackers to achieve their goals. Whether it’s foreign espionage, idealogical fanatacism, or for personal financial gain.

Ultimately, we’re all in this together, a data breach or successful attack on one company could easily have ramifications against your own organizations. As such, employing the right tools, such as an OSINT tool like Signal, to monitor, detect and better protect against potential threats in this growing threat landscape has never been more important. 

The Threat of Doxing to Organizational Security

What is Doxing?

The term itself originates from the phrase “dropping docs” and was later shortened to “docs” and then “dox”. As the original term suggests, doxing is when someone collects and then shares information about another person or organization.

There are numerous reasons someone might dox someone else or be the victim of doxing. It could be for revenge or a personal grudge, a disgruntled ex-employee might target their previous employer, for example. In 2014, Sony was the victim of a doxing attack backed by, experts believe, the North Korean government after they released a film which made fun of their leader. Other motivations include harassment and cyber-bullying, vigilante justice (for example, exposing neo-Nazi’s), and doxing for financial gain. 

Organizational doxing is on the rise and can be immensely damaging, exposing company secrets and customer data, or more directly exposing executives to new levels of threats.

Doxing Strategies and Goals

Traditionally doxing started with an online argument escalating to one person digging out information on their adversary and sharing it online. More recently though, doxing has become more of a cultural tool with hackers taking down people or groups with opposing ideologies. When it comes to organizations, threat actors have been known to both target an organizations reputation and to use information gained through a doxing attack to leverage financial reward.

For example, in one scenario an employee at a bank was blackmailed after a doxing attack into using his position in the bank to steal over $100,000 from customers for his blackmailers. 

The fallout is generally reputational with the victim suffering from online abuse such as death threats to them and their family in lieu of the new information shared. However, on occasion, the fallout can be significantly worse. There have been examples of mobs dishing out physical vigilante justice after a person's information, such as an address, was shared online.

There are numerous ways you can be identified online. By following ‘breadcrumbs’ of information a dedicated doxxer can assemble an accurate picture of a person - even if they were using an alias. The kind of details they might look for include, full name, current address, email address, phone number etc. Additionally, some doxxers might buy information from data brokers.

IP/ ISP Dox

There are various methods that can be used to locate your IP address, which is linked to your location. With just your IP address a doxxer could then use social engineering tactics against your Internet Service Provider (ISP) to discover the information they have on file such as:

• Your full name

• Email address

• Phone number

• ISP account number

• Date of birth

• Exact physical address

• Social security number

This requires the doxxer to go through a dedicated process, which may not even work, however, it’s just one strategy they can employ, and even if they are unable to gather further information through a gullible ISP worker they still have the first parts of the puzzle - your IP address and a rough location.

Doxing with Social Media

If your social media accounts are public then anyone can view them. Often things a threat actor can find out include your location, place of work, your friends, your photos, some of your likes and dislikes, places you’ve been, names of family members, names of pets, names of schools you attended, and more.

With this kind of information, they can then find out even more about you, or even discover the answer to your security questions helping them break into other accounts such as your online banking.

As such it’s recommended to keep your social media profiles private, and if you use multiple online forums to use a different name and password for each to help prevent doxxers from compiling information from across multiple online forums and social media sites. 

Data Gathered through Brokers

Data brokers on the internet collect information from publicly available sources and then sell the data for profit. Generally speaking, they sell this data to advertisers - if you’ve ever found yourself randomly receiving emails from companies you’ve never heard of before, this is why. However, for a doxxer it could be an easy way to start building a detailed profile of their target.

How Might Doxing be Used Against Your Organization?

For organizations to be successful with their media strategies they necessarily need to share relevant information and regularly engage with their customers through social media channels. This provides a substantial opportunity for doxxers.

By combining publicly-available data with basic attack techniques, such as phishing campaigns or credential stuffing, malicious actors can uncover large quantities of supposedly secure data. For consumers, exposed information could lead to identity theft or public shame. Meanwhile, companies face the prospect of large-scale reputation damage or lost revenue if proprietary project briefs or intellectual properties are leaked to the public.

Additionally, doxing can be used as an incentive to expedite the resolution of ransomware attacks. This is where the cyber attacker threatens to release documents or information to the public should their target not pay the ransomware fee promptly. This adds to already serious financial implications.

How Can you Prevent Doxing?

Unfortunately, it's nearly impossible to completely remove personally-identifying information from the internet, especially parts which are part of public records. Still, there are some tips to reduce your attack surface.

Keep your profiles private 

People and organizations do have a lot of say as to what gets published on the internet. Make sure to practice general data privacy best practices.

• Avoid posting identifying information

• Keep all social media settings at the most private level, and don't accept friend requests from people you don't know

• Change the settings on Office and your phone's photo app so personal info isn't embedded in those files

• Use a "burner" email address for signing up for accounts when possible.

• Set the ‘whois’ records on any domains you own to private

• Ask Google to remove personally available information about you, and request the same from data broker sites

Implement Safe Browsing Measures

These steps are good internet hygiene in any case, but can also prevent a breach that can lead to your info being exposed to a potential doxxer:

• Use a VPN, especially when using insecure public Wi-Fi networks

• Switch to a secure email system with built-in encryption

• Vary your usernames and passwords

Self-Doxing

Humans remain the weakest link in the security chain. In most cases, malice isn’t the problem or the intent when someone lets a threat actor in. Instead, employees overshare personal data on corporate platforms by accident or use insecure third-party applications. In both cases, however, following the breach and identifying the potential compromises is difficult when IT teams start from the side of defenders. 

By flipping the script and looking at your organization from the view of potential doxxer it becomes easier for IT and security teams to spot key areas of weakness. They can then develop strategies and staff training programs to protect against them.

Final Words

Doxing represents a growing threat to organizations and individuals. However, by self-doxing with security intelligence gathering strategies, security teams can create accurate attack surface maps. With this intelligence, they can then enhance threat modelling and deliver actionable insights to staff to reduce overall risks.

Using OSINT software like Signal you can learn about potential threats as or before they occur, learn about potential exploits targeting your organization, and self-dox to help identify weaknesses and shore-up defences.

12 of the Biggest Ransomware Attacks of 2020

Ransomware is a form of malware which is installed on a victims device or devices with the main objective of seizing and/or locking away sensitive data. As the name suggests in order for a victim to regain access to their data and systems they need to pay a ransom. More often than not, the two options a victim is presented with when they succumb to a ransomware attack is to either rebuild their systems from scratch and potentially have the attacker leak the data online - or pay up.

As such, it’s unsurprising that, in our increasingly digital age with more and more data on the cloud, that the number of attacks and the success of ransomware attacks is on the rise. Approximately 58% of ransomware victims paid in 2020, compared to 39% in 2017.

Ransoms for these kinds of attacks range from a few hundred dollars to thousands or even millions of dollars payable in cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. In return for the payout, the attackers will release a decryption key allowing the organization to return to business. Certain industries, such as government organizations and hospitals are more susceptible to ransomware attacks due to the nature of the work that they do often being time-sensitive. For example, a ransomware attack crippled a hospital in Germany, leading directly to one patient’s death.  

There are numerous strategies that ransomware attackers employ to gain access to a victims database. One of the most common though is through social engineering tactics, such as phishing emails. Cybercriminals can make these emails look exactly like trustworthy emails from official sources, tricking victims into downloading compromised software onto their device. 

Because of the nature of social engineering tactics, and the evolving cyber threat landscape no organization can ever be fully secure from malware threats. Below we outline 12 of the biggest ransomware attacks that occurred in 2020.

12 Ransomware Attacks that Happened in 2020

1. ISS World 

Estimated cost: $74 million 

In February of 2020 ISS world, a Denmark based company went down due to a ransomware attack. Thousands of employees were left without access to their systems and emails. This cost them an estimated $74 million which includes regaining control of the affected IT systems and re-launching critical business systems. 

2. Cognizant

Estimated cost: $50 million

A ransomware attack on the organization Cognizant in April of 2020 is said to have cost the company over $50 million, potentially as much as $70 million, including legal and consultation costs and data recovery costs, along with the financial loss reflected in their second-quarter earning in 2020.

3. Sopra Steria 

Estimated cost: $50 million

The company Sopra Steria revealed that they were hit by hackers using a new version of the Ryuk ransomware in October.

They estimate that the fallout, including dealing with the various systems that went out of action, is likely to have a gross negative impact on operating margin of between €40 million and €50 million.

4. Redcar and Cleveland Council 

Estimated cost: $14 million

Redcar and Cleveland Council in the UK suffered an attack on their systems in February of 2020 costing the council an estimated $14 million.  The ransomware attack is said to have disrupted the company’s network, tablets, computers, and mobile devices for 3 full weeks. The council announced that in March, that it could take months for a full recovery and estimated the overall costs to be between $14 - $21 million.

5. Software AG

Estimated cost: $20 million

Software AG is the second-largest software vendor in Germany. They were reportedly hit with the Clop ransomware in an attack in October of 2020. The company disclosed that the ransomware attack disrupted a part of its internal network but didn’t affect customer services. The cybercriminal group responsible demanded a $23 million ransom.

7. Travelex

Estimated cost: $2.3 million

It was reported that Travelex the money exchange firm was hit with a file-encrypting malware attack which shut down its internal networks, website and apps for several weeks. Reportedly Travelex paid a ransom of $2.3 million in BTC to the dark actors to regain access to their data and restore services.

8. University of California San Francisco (UCSF)

Estimated cost: $1.14 million

UCSF was targeted by a malware attack which encrypted servers used by the school of medicine impacting students in June of 2020. The ransomware was prevented from travelling to the core UCSF network and causing more damage. The authorities negotiated with the cybercriminals and UCSF ended up paying approximately $1.14 million in ransom of the $3 million demanded. 

9. Shirbit Insurance 

Estimated cost: $1million

After a cyberattack on the Israeli Insurance provider Shirbit in December of 2020 the attackers demanded roughly $1 million in Bitcoin. In order to pressure the company into paying they demanded immediate payment or an increase in the ransom cost, doubling after 24 hours. Additionally, to show they weren’t empty threats they dumped the first 300 records online, again threatening to dump additional records every 24 hours until they received payment.

10. Communications and Power industries 

Estimated cost: $500,000

California-based Communications & Power Industries (CPI) makes components for military devices and equipment, like radar, missile seekers and electronic warfare technology. The company counts the U.S. Department of Defense and its advanced research unit DARPA as customers. Reportedly, CPI paid $500,000 to obtain the decryption key to unlock their servers and return services.

11. Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks 

Estimated cost: $365,000

Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks is a law firm that specializes in law for those in the media and entertainment industry. Their clients consist of a range of A-list celebrities and, with such high profile individuals on the line, the stakes for them were extremely high. They were targeted and files encrypted by REvil ransomware. The firm agreed to pay an estimated $365,000, however, the attackers started demanding more afterwards and the company has since kept quiet on what it has or is willing to pay.

12. Tillamook County 

Estimated cost: $300,000

Tillamook county in the US was attacked by cyber attackers in January. The attack interrupted their email network, phone systems and website. After exhausting alternative options, they estimated the costs to restore service would cost well over $1 million and take several years and opted instead to pay the $300,000 ransom. 

Keeping your data and organization secure

1. Never click on suspicious links or any links attached in unsolicited emails. 

2. Back up systems and data continuously. Create a separate data-backup in an external hard drive that is not connected to your computer, so that you don’t have to pay the ransom if a ransomware attack happens.

3. Never disclose personal information over the phone or over email. 

4. Educate employees of cybersecurity best practices and social engineering tactics that may be used against them.

5. Limit employee access to sensitive data to reduce attack surfaces.

OSINT Tools and Mitigating Costly Ransomware Attacks

Early warning of data beaches through OSINT tools can help you predict and prevent cyber attacks as well as enable organizations to take mitigating actions faster. While open-source intelligence tools can’t prevent ransomware, they can help organizations reduce the risks and potential damages. 

OSINT tools can be used by organizations to monitor their supply chains, allowing them to learn of potential disruptions in real-time and enabling them to implement contingency plans fast. 

Additionally, organizations can use tools like Signal to monitor for ransomware and malware currently being used. This can help security teams determine emerging threats being used against other organizations in their industry to better inform ongoing cybersecurity best practices.

Ultimately, by using OSINT to monitor darknet forums and market places security professionals are able to learn about the newest strategies being employed, the most recent weaknesses being exploited, and the most current software being utilized. Armed with this knowledge they are much more able to develop effective countermeasures as well as actively prevent ransomware infection.

Why you Need to Upgrade your Social Media Security

For organizations, social media is vital for the success of their business. It forms a central part of their efforts to build brand awareness, establish their community, do market research and gather intelligence. However, because of the frequency with which it’s used and the importance of the role it plays, social media cybersecurity threats can have a very tangible impact on an organization through reputational damage, data breaches, or worse.

In a recent survey by Statista, it was revealed that 22% of internet users said that their online accounts have been hacked at least once, while 14% reported they were hacked more than once. Due to the constantly changing nature of technology and trends, it’s difficult to pin down a defined set of best practices. 

In this article, we take a look at why and how attackers target social accounts as well as reviewing some of the current best practices for mitigating the risks.

Why Do Hackers Target Social Media Accounts?

A successful account takeover can enable threat actors to achieve a variety of malicious objectives, from the distribution of malware to the spreading of misinformation. Some of the most common uses for a compromised account are as follows:

Continuing the Attack: Generally speaking, most people are wary of random messages from strangers. However, if you can gain access to someone’s account and launch your phishing campaign against their contacts you can leverage the trust already established as a personal contact to dramatically improve the success rate of the phishing campaign. In the case of an organization’s account, these attacks are particularly harmful as they can target thousands or even millions of followers and can come with serious associated reputational damage.

Gathering Intelligence: The actual account takeover might not be the endgame of the attack. Instead by taking over an account, they gain access to intelligence, from an individual's messaging history to extensive personal details on an individual and their contacts.

Reputational Damage: We’ve already mentioned the potential for reputation damage as a by-product. However, there is a chance that reputation damage is the entire objective of the attack. Attackers might have a grudge against an organization or person, for example. Once they have access to the account they could do a range of things, such as posting racist slurs from the account or directly targeting followers through the account.

Credential Stuffing: Many people use the same login credentials across websites. Once attackers have successfully compromised an account, they then attempt logins at other popular websites using the same credentials to see what else they can gain access to. Often the objective is a financial reward.

Blackmail: If embarrassing or damaging information is surfaced through the account attack then hackers are unlikely to miss the opportunity to blackmail the individual or organization to further their other objectives.

4 Examples of Successful Social Media Attacks

LinkedIn Hacked, Exposing 117 Million Credentials

• When: May 2016

• Tactic: Data Breach, Account Takeover

• The 2016 LinkedIn data breach exposed 117 million records of its users including email and password combinations. These were sold on the dark web and allowed hackers to gain access to and control thousands of accounts as well as use the data for credential stuffing.

Vevo Hacked Via LinkedIn Phishing

• When: September 2017

• Tactic: Targeted Phishing & Malware

• In 2017 the streaming service Vevo suffered a breach when one of its employees was phished via LinkedIn. Through this attack, hackers obtained and publicly released over 3TB worth of the company’s sensitive internal data.

HAMMERTOSS Malware

• When: July 2015

• Tactic: Malware/Data Exfiltration

• HAMMERTOSS is a malware which was created to automatically search and extract data from social networks and was controlled by commands posted by attacker profiles. This novel approach to weaponizing social media shows the need to analyze social media as part of the full lifecycle of a cyber attack. 

Twitter Bitcoin Scam

• When: July 2020

• Tactic: Account Takeover

• Through a series of targeted phishing campaigns, hackers were able to get access to internal systems and tools at Twitter. They used this access to take control of numerous high profile accounts, including verified accounts such as Kanye West, Barack Obama, Apple, and Joe Biden. The attackers used the platform to Tweet a message requesting Bitcoin be sent to a specific wallet number with a promise they’d return it doubled. In the short time the message was up the attackers collected over $100,000.

6 Quick Tips to Improve your Organizations Social Media Cybersecurity

1. Employ strong unique passwords.

Avoid the risks of credential stuffing by ensuring that all accounts are locked with strong unique passwords.

2. Keep personal and business accounts separate.

Linking personal and business accounts just make it easier for hackers to gain access to both. So, when possible, keep a separate and distinct login and password for both. 

3. Restrict access and permissions.

Not everyone needs to have the ability to login to the organization’s social media accounts. Not everyone needs to be able to post, share or send messages through it. Additionally, when an employee leaves make sure to revoke their access to all social media accounts.

4. Be mindful about what you share.

Even harmless posts might unwittingly share sensitive data that could be used by attackers. For example, you might share an employee update, maybe congratulating an employee for having a child, information which could be used in a targeted spear-phishing campaign.

5. Protect the physical access points.

Make sure devices are password-protected, don’t leave USB devices lying around, ensure that wi-fi networks are private and secure. These physical security threats are particularly prevalent currently with many employees working from home. 

6. Be wary of third-party apps.

Third-party apps like scheduling softwares are invaluable, allowing you to save a huge amount of time. However, they also provide an additional way for attackers to gain access to your social media accounts. 

The Role of OSINT in Securing Social Media Platforms

By monitoring social networks for mentions of your brand and keywords, you’ll know right away when suspicious conversations about your brand emerge. For example, people might be sharing fake coupons or offers, or an imposter account starts tweeting in your name. Using OSINT you can monitor all the relevant activity online regarding your business and quickly identify fraud allowing you to respond to it in a timely fashion.

Additionally, you can use OSINT tools like Signal to monitor not only your social media channels for things like imposters but also for physical threats against employees or branch locations. 

OSINT is vital in identifying when one of the above-mentioned risks of social media becomes more than just a threat when it becomes a reality. Being amongst the first to know when something like this happens allows you to respond quickly and effectively.

How Machine Learning is Changing Modern Security Intelligence

A key challenge facing modern security teams is the explosion of new potential threats, both cyber and physical, and the speed with which new exploits are taken advantage of. Additionally, in our globalized world threats can evolve from innumerable sources and manifest as a diverse range of hazards.

Because of this, security teams need to efficiently utilize automation technology and machine learning to identify threats as or even before they emerge if they want to mitigate risks or prevent attacks.

Artificial Intelligence in the Cyber Security Arms Race

Today, AI and machine learning play active roles on both sides of the cybersecurity struggle, enabling both attackers and defenders to operate at new magnitudes of speed and scale.

When thinking about the role of machine learning for corporate security and determining the need, you first need to understand how it is already being used for adversarial applications. For example, machine learning algorithms are being used to implement massive spear-phishing campaigns. Attackers harvest data through hacks and open-source intelligence (OSINT) and then can deploy ‘intelligent’ social engineering strategies with relatively high success rate. Often this can be largely automated which ultimately allows previously unseen volumes of attack to be deployed with very little effort.

Another key example, a strategy that has been growing in popularity as the technology evolves, making it both more effective and harder to prevent, is Deepfake attacks. This uses AI to mimic voice and appearance in audio and video files. This is a relatively new branch of attack in the spread of disinformation and can be harnessed to devastating effect. For example, there are serious fears of the influence they may bring to significant future political events such as the 2020 US Presidential Election.

These are just two of the more obvious strategies currently being implemented in a widespread fashion by threat actors. AI supported cyberattacks though have the potential to go much further. IBM’s DeepLocker, for example, describes an entirely new class of malware in which AI models can be used to disguise malware, carrying it as a ‘payload’ to be launched when specific criteria are met - for example, facial recognition of its target.

Managing Data Volumes

One of the primary and critical uses of AI for security professionals is managing data volumes. In fact, in Capgemini’s 2019 cybersecurity report 61% of organizations acknowledged that they would not be able to identify critical threats without AI because of the quantities of data it is necessary to analyze.

“Machine learning can be used as a ‘first pass’, to bring the probable relevant posts up to the top and push the irrelevant ones to the bottom. The relevant posts for any organization are typically less than 0.1% of the total mass of incoming messages, so efficient culling is necessary for the timely retrieval of the relevant ones.” - Thomas Bevan, Head Data Scientist at Signal.

Without the assistance of advanced automation softwares and AI, it becomes impossible to make timely decisions - impossible to detect anomalous activity. The result of which is that those organizations who don’t employ AI and automation softwares for intelligence gathering often miss critical threats or only discover them when it’s too late.

Signal OSINT and Machine Learning

Signal OSINT platform uses machine learning and automation techniques to improve data collection and aggregation. The platform allows you to create targeted searches using Boolean logic, but it is our machine learning capabilities which allow us to go beyond Boolean keyword searches. 

“By recognising patterns in speech and relations between commonly used words, one can find examples of relevant posts even without keywords. While phrases like ‘I’m gonna kill the boss’ can be picked up by keywords easily, keyword searches alone struggle with more idiomatic speech like, ‘I’m gonna put the boss six feet under’, and will incorrectly flag posts like ‘Check out the new glory kill animation on the final boss’. Machine learning, given the right training data, can be taught to handle these sorts of examples,” says Thomas Bevan.

Signal continuously scans the surface, deep, and dark web and has customizable SMS and Email alert capability so that security teams can get real-time alerts from a wide array of data sources such as Reddit, 4Chan, 8Kun etc. Additionally, Signal allows teams to monitor and gather data from dark web sources that they would otherwise be unable to access either for security reasons or because of captive portals.

Finally, the software allows users to analyze data across languages and translate posts for further human analysis. There are additional capabilities, such as our emotional analysis tool Spotlight, which can help indicate the threat level based on language indicators.

Complementing AI with Human Intelligence

In order to stay ahead of this rapidly evolving threat landscape, security professionals should be using a layered approach that pairs the strategic advantages of machine learning to parse through the vast quantities of new data with human intelligence to make up for current flaws in AI technology.

Machines have been at the forefront of security for decades now. Their role though is evolving as they get passed the heavy lifting, allowing analysts and security professionals to analyse hyper-relevant data efficiently. 

Why organizations need threat intelligence tools as part of their security defences

What is Threat Intelligence?

Those very same technologies that have allowed globalization, which have brought us all closer together and enabled organizations and brands to achieve the current growth and success they enjoy today, have simultaneously brought with them increased risks. These risks come in the form of increased vulnerabilities and exploitable attack vectors for cyber attackers. Threat intelligence is all about gathering data and knowledge to combat and mitigate these threats. 

Threat intelligence provides organizations with information and context required to effectively predict and even prevent cyberattacks. Additionally, it helps inform security teams of the best practice for both preventative measures and response measures to ensure if there is a cyberattack the resulting costs are minimal. 

In short, threat intelligence is the gathering of evidence-based knowledge to inform action-oriented preventative and reactionary responses to an ever-evolving cyber threat landscape.

The Importance of Threat Intelligence

Threat actors are increasingly persistent, and their persistence pays off. Even the most dedicated professionals can’t help but struggle to keep abreast of every new cybersecurity development. New exploits are constantly being discovered or developed and strategies such as social engineering are increasing in complexity. Security teams need up to date data and intelligence on evolving threats if they are going to be able to develop effective responses.

Additionally, within the corporate world one of the key buzzwords of the last two decades has been “accessibility”. Accessibility to data means organizations have necessarily become reliant on digital processes and almost everything is stored on the cloud. Unfortunately, while accessibility is essential to developing efficient processes, and effectively using big data, it also increases the number of threat vectors that attackers can exploit. According to the IBM 2020 data breach report the longer a data breach goes undetected the more expensive it ends up being for the organization. Primarily then, threat intelligence gathered using tools like Signal OSINT can help organizations detect data breaches earlier, mitigating the eventual costs both reputational and monetary.

The final reason that threat intelligence plays such a pivotal role in today’s security is the distinct lack of skilled cybersecurity professionals. Threat intelligence is a time-consuming business that requires a skilled deft hand to manage. The best threat intelligence solutions use machine learning to automate data collection, then filter and structure data from disparate sources to present only hyper-relevant information to a skilled security team for final analysis. The security team can then use this data to create effective actionable plans based on evidential knowledge. This approach optimizes the performance of both the cybersecurity professional and the intelligence tools being used.

Threat intelligence is actionable — it’s timely, provides context, and is able to be understood by the people in charge of making decisions.

Use Case Examples for Threat Intelligence 

Threat intelligence can be used in a diverse range of strategies which makes it an essential tool for security teams in any organization. It’s most immediate value is in helping prevent an attack by gathering intel on threats in real-time, however, it’s also useful for a broad scope of activities such as managing vulnerabilities, informing decision making, and responding to attacks as or after they happen.

Related: The Role of Threat Intelligence and Cybersecurity in Retail

Prevent an attack

From the time that a vulnerability is found to the time an exploit targeting that vulnerability is available for threat actors is shortening. Security professionals need to know about the vulnerability fast so that they can implement a patch and prevent it from being exploited.

Respond to a Data Breach

Data breaches are costly and often go unnoticed. With the right threat intelligence tools you can determine when a data breach happens fast and take suitable actions to mitigate the costs of any following repercussions.

Manage a Vulnerability

The approach of “patch everything, all the time” is impractical and will likely see organizations fall behind - leaving more serious vulnerabilities open for longer. Threat intelligence can help security teams effectively manage vulnerabilities by giving the salient data to allow them to prioritize patches based on actual risk. 

Risk Analysis

This leads on nicely from the last point. Threat intelligence can help security teams determine the actual risks associated with potential vulnerabilities or attacks by providing additional contextual information. For example, threat intelligence can help security professionals  answer the following questions:

• Which threat actors are using this attack, and do they target our industry?

• How often has this specific attack been observed recently by enterprises like ours?

• Which vulnerabilities does this attack exploit, and are those vulnerabilities present in our enterprise?

• What kind of damage, technical and financial, has this attack caused in enterprises like ours?

Fraud Prevention

Fraud can encompass anything from a fraudulent use of your brand, data, or even impersonation of your employees. For example, an individual might impersonate a doctor and sell fake versions of your prescription medication online.

Incident Response

Having the ability to gather and filter through threat intelligence from across the surface, deep, and dark web in real-time allows security teams to effectively and appropriately respond to incidents as they are happening.

How can Signal threat intelligence improve your organization’s security?

Signal allows our customers to analyze emerging global trends, detect threats in real-time, and then form appropriate security strategies to counter these potential threats as or even before they fully reveal themselves.

One of the key issues that security teams and analysts face is the sheer amount of noise that might surround their brand. Invariably much of this noise is irrelevant to their purposes, however, some of it will be bad. This is why Signal assists with advanced filters with boolean logic as well as features such as our emotional analysis tool.

How Can Organizations Combat Increasing Cybersecurity Gaps due to Remote Working During COVID-19?

Whether they like it or not, many organizations have been forced to adopt work from home practices to continue operating. Working from home isn’t new. In fact, between 2005 and 2017 the numbers of people that were able to work from home grew 156%. However, it has generally been seen as a bonus rather than a given and more traditional workplaces have been resistant. 

Despite the fact that 49% of office workers have never experienced working from home before, this experiment has largely been a success. Empowered with communication tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Hangouts. and Zoom, teams have had deep connectivity even from their own living rooms and many organizations have actually seen increased productivity.

Even so, the challenges of working from home are enormous and are invariably compounded by technological difficulties and poor home security practices.

Security teams, in particular, are feeling the pressure. With numerous workers now operating outside the corporate network security controls, new attack vectors have been opened up which are being exploited by cybercriminals.

Cybercriminals Taking Advantage of the Pandemic

Several security providers have put together data sets which show clear spikes in malicious activity since the beginning of the pandemic. McAfee created its own coronavirus dashboard which shows malicious detections quickly growing from the hundreds into the thousands over the last six months. The most common threat type has been Trojans with Spain and the US being clear outliers in the number of threats detected.

As of August, there were nearly 2 million malicious detections against over 5,500 unique organizations. McAfee go into detail about the families and types of attacks that they’ve seen a spike of cases in since the pandemic began.

WFH challenges for security teams

We’ve established that cybercriminals are taking advantage of the security breaches created by a sudden adoption of working from home but what is it exactly that makes working from home lees secure and what exactly are the security flaws threat actors are targeting?

Working from home doesn’t necessarily mean working from home, it could also mean working from anywhere and many workers have already figured that out. This means workers can (in theory) escape their houses and head out to cafes, restaurants, libraries or other public spaces with free WiFi networks. Zoom, with its virtual background feature, has incidentally supported this. The key issue with this is when workers operate on unsecured open networks. 

Ultimately security professionals have to try and ensure device security and data protection in the work from anywhere model - a challenge made significantly harder with over 50% of employees using their own devices during this period. IT teams have tried to make the security transition easier, with some 70% increasing VPN use among employees, however, 1 in 4 workers according to the Morphisec report were unfamiliar with their company’s security protocols.

This challenge for security professionals has resulted in the majority of security professionals seeing a sizeable increase in workload since their companies began corporatewide remote work. And while most of the transition to WFH went smoothly, respondents reported an increase of security incidents, with the top issues including a rise in malicious emails, non-compliant behavior by employees and an increase in software vulnerabilities.

What can be done to improve WFH security?

Security teams have had years to develop best practices for combating the ever-evolving cyber threat landscape. The sudden move to work from home though has shifted power away from them and brought a greater reliance onto workers who simply do not have the expertise to maintain proper cybersecurity protocols. 

Worryingly, 20% of workers said their IT team had not provided any tips as they shifted to working from home. This has opened exploitable attack vectors and introduced new challenges for security professionals. This though isn’t to say that there is nothing that can be done.

Step 1: Control the WFH Environment

This is all about educating employees about best practice and the reasons for these practices when working from home. For example, informing them not to use open networks.

Step 2: Control the WFH Computer

It’s a good idea to supply the computer being used so that you can install the proper security softwares and control access to sites which might offer security risks as well as maintaining control over permissions.

Step 3: Improve your Phishing Responses 

The crossover between home life and work life extends beyond the location. People are more likely to spend time on social media networks and working on private projects than they would be if they were in the office. This opens them up to more phishing campaigns so it’s important they know how to avoid falling for them.

Step 4: Restrict Remote Access to Sensitive Documents and Data

Lockdown permissions and access to sensitive documents and data. If they really need access they can communicate this need with you directly and you can ensure it is done securely and safely. 

Step 5: Monitor Surface, Deep and Dark Web for Emerging Cyber-Threats

Use an OSINT tool like Signal to monitor for cyber threats, planned attacks and data breaches.

Step 6: Encourager VPN Usage

VPNs are a simple and easy way to improve security. It’s worth ensuring the company has a quality VPN service that doesn’t slow a users internet connection unnecessarily as this might persuade workers to turn it off.

Step 7: Don’t Allow Split-Tunnels

Split-tunnelling allows a user to access networks through both the encrypted VPN service and a potentially unsecure network simultaneously.

The Role of Threat Intelligence for Improving Work From Home Cybersecurity

One of the key benefits of using an OSINT solution like Signal is the ability to create customized searches with Boolean logic to uncover hyper-relevant threats in real-time with SMS and email alerts. 

Ways that this has been used in the past to improve cybersecurity include:

• Early detection of data breaches. The average cost of a data breach in 2020 is $3.86 million. The earlier you catch a data breach the faster you can take action to mitigate the associated financial and reputational damage.

• Discovery of new cyberattack strategies, exploit kits, phishing tactics which were talked about or for sale on the dark web.

• Organizations have uncovered attacks that are yet to be carried out. This is true for both physical attacks against an asset or person as well as cyberattacks. For example, details of a phishing strategy and the targets within the organization were discovered after being talked about in a darknet forum. 

• Monitor employee online activity. For example, this can allow security teams to identify employees who have been targeted and even blackmailed by cyber attackers for access to company data.

6 Common Social Engineering Tactics and How to Prevent Them

Social engineering is an attempt by attackers to fool or manipulate others into surrendering access details, credentials, banking information, or other sensitive data. Once access is gained the general goal is to gain money. 

Recently, for example, Twitter was subject to a high profile social engineering attack. Attackers manipulated several Twitter employees to gain access to the platforms admin accounts. Once they got access they used the admin privileges to post a tweet saying “All Bitcoin sent to our address below will be sent back to you doubled!”  They posted on a number of celebrity and company profiles including Apple, Bill Gates, Elon Musk and Joe Biden.

Twitter shut the attack down quickly but not before the attackers got away with an estimated $120,000 USD worth of Bitcoin.

Social engineering is a creative strategy for attackers to exploit human emotion and ego, generally for a financial reward. It often forms part of other strategies as well such as ransomware. 

In this article, we take a look at some of the more common forms and tactics of social engineering as well as exploring just how an organization can protect itself from such an attack.

What are the stages of a social engineering attack?

In general, social engineering attacks are implemented in three stages.

1. Research. Attackers perform research to identify potential targets as well as to determine what strategies might work best against these particular targets. Attackers will likely collect data off company websites, LinkedIn and other social media profiles and potentially even in-person.

2. Planning. Once the attackers know who they will be targeting and have an idea of the targets potential weaknesses, they have to put together a strategy that is likely to work. The attacker needs to design the strategy and specific messages they will use to exploit the target’s individual weaknesses. Sometimes discussions surrounding plans can be found on darknet forums.

3. Implementation. The first stage of execution of their prepared strategy is often sending messages through email, social media messaging or some other messaging platform. Depending on their approach the entire process could be automated, targeting a broad number of individuals, or it might be more personal with the attacker interacting personally with their victim. Generally, they are aiming to gain access to private accounts, uncover banking or credit card details, or to install malware.

6 of the Most Common Social Engineering Attack Strategies

1. Phishing and Spear Phishing.

Phishing messages are designed to get a victim’s attention with an alarming or curious message. They work on emotional triggers and often masquerade as well known brands making it seem like the messages come from a legitimate source.

Most phishing messages have a sense of urgency about them causing the victim to believe that something negative will happen if they don’t surrender their details. For example, they might pose as a banking institute and pretend to be a fraud notice asking them to log into their account immediately, however, the email actually links to a fake login page.

Spear phishing is similar but with a more targeted individualistic approach.

2. Baiting.

A baiting attack generally pretends to offer something that the victim would find useful, for example, a software update. However, instead of a useful update or new software, it is, in fact, a malicious file or malware. 

3. Scareware. 

Playing on the targets fear this approach seeks to persuade the target that there is already a malware installed on their computer, or perhaps seek to persuade them that they already have access to their email address. This attack will then persuade the target to pay a fee to remove the malware. 

4. Pretexting.

In a pretexting atack the attacker creates a fake identity and they use it to manipulate their victims into providing private information. For example, the attacker might pretend t be part of a third-party IT service provider. They would then ask for the users account details and password in order to assist them with a problem. 

5. Quid Pro Quo. 

Similar to baiting, a quid pro quo attack promises to perform an action which will benefit the target. For example, an attacker might call an individual in company who has a technical support inquiry and then pretend to help them. However, instead of actually helping them they get the individual to compromise the security of their own device.

6. Tailgating.

Tailgating is a physical type of social engineering. It enables criminals to gain physical access to a building or secure area. An example of how this might work would be the criminal following behind someone authorized to access an area, they ask the person ahead to simply hold the door for them assuming an air of innocence.

How to Prevent Social Engineering

One of the key reasons social engineering is so difficult to protect against is because of the variety of ways it can be implemented. Attackers can be incredibly creative and this can make it very hard to spot a social engineering attack. Additionally, security professionals have to contend with skilful manipulation of the human ego.

Social engineering attacks exploit human behaviour. They target peoples fears or concerns often with messaging that centres around urgency attempting to encourage victims to take action immediately before they figure out they are part of a social engineering attack. Key to prevention then is remaining suspicious of emails, voicemails, or instant messages through platforms such as Facebook. 

Additionally, security teams need to stay ahead of the attackers. They need to be aware of each variation of a particular social engineering attack. Using OSINT tools, for example, they can learn about current messaging and strategies being implemented as well as potential exploits. Allowing them to take actions to mitigate evolving and emerging threats.

Increased awareness and vigilance though is only the first step. These attacks are common because they are effective, and they are effective because they take advantage of inherently human traits. Changing this human behaviour though doesn’t happen overnight. An internal education strategy needs to be put in place to regularly inform and teach employees about current social engineering strategies in an effort to reduce the potential for any employee to fall prey to one. In these ways, security professionals can mitigate the potential risks that surround social engineering attacks.

What is Ransomware and Why Should you Care?

Ransomware is big money and is a rapidly growing cyberattack strategy. The market has expanded massively since the advent of secure and untraceable payment methods such as Bitcoin. Emsisoft estimates that ransomware costs for US organizations in 2019 was in excess of $7.5 billion. Compare this to four years prior when in 2015 ransomware damages totalled around $300 million.

Some markets are particularly prone to ransomware attacks such as medical organizations and public services. And there have been several high profile cases involving these industries over the last few years. Attackers know that with lives literally on the line organizations in these fields are likely to simply pay the ransom to make the problem go away. Most recently Garmin technology company has been held to ransom with attackers using the WastedLocker ransomware seeking a ransom of USD$10 million.

In this article, we explore in detail what ransomware is, how cybercriminals utilize and what strategies organizations can employ to ensure they are protected from ransomware attacks.  

What is Ransomware?

Ransomware is a form of malware. It can take various forms but generally it functions in one of two ways:

• Crypto ransomware. This malware encrypts the files on a computer so that the user cannot access them.

• Locker ransomware. This malware locks the victim out of their device or out of particular files, preventing them from using it. 

One thing all ransomware attacks have in common is that the target won’t be able to regain access to their files unless they pay the attackers a hefty ransom to unlock the files.

Ransomware has grown in popularity over the last few years in the wake of cryptocurrencies which makes it safe to receive their ransom payments. The cost of a ransomware attack can range from a few hundred to thousands of dollars depending on who the target is and how valuable the attackers believe the files they have locked out of reach are. 

Probably the most common delivery system for ransomware is phishing scams. For examples, a virus masquerading as an email attachment can, once downloaded and opened, easily take over a victims computer. Another strategy is through social engineering which is growing in popularity with cybercriminals because of the better strike rate. A recent example of a successful social engineering attack was perpetrated against Twitter employees. Attackers were able to get aways with an estimated 12.85BTC, nearly US$120,000.

The encryption strategy for malware is the more common of the attacks. The result of this attack is that the victim will not be able to decrypt their files without a mathematical key known only to the attacker. The user will be presented with a message when they attempt to open their files saying that their documents are now inaccessible and will only be decrypted if the victim sends an untraceable cryptocurrency payment to the attacker’s wallet.

To encourage prompt payment attackers might masquerade as law enforcement and demand the payment as a fine. If the victim does have illegal or illicit files or programs on their device, such as pornography or pirated software or movies, then they may be more likely to pay without asking questions and without reporting the attack.

12 Ransomware Examples from the Last Decade

Ransomware has been around for decades. However, it was only after the advent of cryptocurrencies that it began being a favoured strategy for cybercriminals. Cryptocurrencies allow for them to collect untraceable completely anonymous payments. Some of the worst offenders have been:

• CryptoLocker is an older malware threat, and while it isn’t in broad circulation anymore during it’s peak it infected some half a million machines. Cryptolocker is a Trojan horse that infects a device computer and then searches the computer as well as additional connected media including; external hardrives, cloud storage, and USB sticks, for files to encrypt. 

• TeslaCrypt is a variation or copycat of CryptoLocker. TeslaCrypt started by using social engineering to infiltrate devices and later used phishing emails as well. It heavily targeted gaming files and saw numerous upgrade improvements during its reign of terror.

• SimpleLocker was another CyrptoLocker styled malware. However, it’s key difference was that it focused it’s targeting on Android devices.

• WannaCry is a ransomware worm. What this means is that it spreads autonomously from computer to computer using EternalBlue, an exploit developed by the NSA and then stolen by hackers.

• NotPetya also used the EternalBlue exploit. It is thought to be part of a Russion-directed cyberattack against the Ukraine. However, it expanded autonomously to infect a broad range of organizations.

• Leakerlocker was first discovered in 2017 and targeted Android devices. Rather than encrypt files, it threatens to share your private data and browsing history unless you pay the ransom.

• WYSIWYE, stands for “What You See Is What You Encrypt”. Discovered in 2017, this ransomware scans the web for open Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) servers. It then allows for a customized attack with an interface through which it can be configured according to the attacker’s preferences.

• SamSam has been around since 2015 and has affected devices in a number of waves of attacks. It utilizes vulnerabilities in remote desktop protocols (RDP), Java-based web servers, file transfer protocol (FTP) servers or brute force against weak passwords It would then spread to numerous devices. It primarily targeted public services and healthcare effectively bringing entire organizations to halt.

• Ryuk first appeared in 2018. It is specifically used to target enterprise environments. It is often used in combination with other malware like TrickBot for distribution.

• Maze was first discover in 2019. The MAZE ransomware has been used in attacks that combine targeted ransomware use, public exposure of victim data, and an affiliate model. The ransomware was initially distributed via spam emails and exploit kits before later shifting to being deployed post-compromise.

• GandCrab currently holds a large portion of the ransomware market and may well be the most lucrative ransomware ever. Its developers, which sold the program to cybercriminals, claim more than $2 billion in victim payouts as of July 2019.

• Thanos is a Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) operation which allows affiliates to customize their own ransomware through a builder offered by the developer. It was first discovered by security professionals being talked about on a Russian darknet forum. It is the first to use the RIPlace technique, which can bypass many anti-ransomware methods.  

Dealing with Ransomware

Prevention is always the best policy when it comes to dealing with cyber attacks. Using tools such as Signal you can stay up to date with the most common strategies and one step ahead of cybercriminals. However, if you become the victim of a ransomware attack, it is advisable not to pay the ransom. If you do so there is now guarantee that the cybercriminal will return your data, they are thieves after all. Additionally, it fuels the profitability of the ransomware business making future attacks more likely. So what can you do?

Decryption

For many ransomwares, especially the older ones there are decryption tools which have been developed. The first step then is to contact your internet security vendor and determine if decryption is possible. If this initial strategy fails you can visit nomoreransom.org. The No More Ransom site is an industry-wide initiative designed to help all victims of ransomware.

Recovery

It’s good practice to back-up your data regularly on both external hard drives as well as on cloud storage. If you have done this it becomes possible to simply recover the data which is currently being held hostage. There are of course some scenarios where this won’t be possible, for example, if the malicious actor is threatening to share private information rather than having simply encrypted your device.

Preventing Ransomware Attacks

Good security practices will help prevent you from falling victim to ransomware. These defensive steps will additionally help protect you against other generic cyber attacks. 

Four basic steps that every organization should take to mitigate the threat of cyber attacks are:

• Keep all operating systems up to date and patched. Doing this will ensure that there are few potential vulnerabilities that malicious actors can exploit.

• Do not allow a software admin privileges unless you are confident in its safety and know exactly what it is and what it does.

• Ensure you have an active and up to date anti-virus software installed on all devices. This will allow you to detect and block malicious programs like ransomware as they arrive.

• And, as we said in the section above, back up all your files regularly. This last point won’t help protect against ransomware or other malware but can help mitigate the damages that your organization might suffer.

The Role of OSINT in Defending Against Ransomware

While open source intelligence tools can’t prevent ransomware, they can help organizations mitigate the potential damages. 

Securing the supply chain

Supply chains can stretch across continents with potentially hundreds of suppliers and manufacturers all around the world bearing responsibility. Should any single part or resource be in short supply, then assembly lines can be brought to a halt resulting in costly delays at the very least. 

There are numerous threats to the supply chain, one of which is malware and in particular regard to this article, ransomware. A key example of this is when the shipping giant Maersk had their IT systems taken out by a malware NotPetya. This resulted in their IT systems being down for days and many deliveries being delayed despite Herculean logistical efforts by the company. 

Using OSINT tools you can learn whether an organization on your supply chain has been affected by ransomware in real-time which will allow you to take the necessary actions to mitigate the damage this has as their production or logistics is slowed.

Industry Targeting

It’s not unusual for malware to exploit weaknesses which are specific to an industry. For example, the Healthcare industry is particularly susceptible to ransomware as a delay in returning their operations to normal could result in patients deaths. Indeed a leading medical-research institution working on a cure for Covid-19 were forced to pay hackers a $1.14m USD ransom because of a ransomware attack.

Using OSINT tools you can monitor your own specific industry to determine what strategies and exploits are currently being used by cybercriminals against like companies. Determining this will allow you to take extra and specific precautions to fend off similar attacks which could potentially be turned on you.

Detect New Ransomware and Strategies

Cybercriminals are continuously evolving and updating their strategies and the ransomware that go with them. We are unlikely to see the end of this development. 

By using OSINT to monitor darknet forums and market places security professionals are able to learn about the newest strategies being employed, the most recent weaknesses being exploited, and the most current software being utilized. Armed with this knowledge they are much more able to develop effective countermeasures as well as actively prevent ransomware infection.