INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Enterprise Security
Almost one-third of A / NZ businesses have paid off ransomware attackers
Research from Rubrik finds banking and government sectors among those most likely to pay hackers .
Rubrik , a cloud data management
company , has revealed almost onein-three ( 29 %) Australian and New Zealand organizations which fell victim to ransomware attacks in the past two years had paid off the criminal groups responsible to regain access to their data .
This insight emerged from IDC ’ s A / NZ Ransomware Survey , August 2020 , commissioned by Rubrik .
This finding and others were included in an IDC InfoBrief , Building Business Resiliency in Australia and New Zealand Using a Ransomware Remediation Backup Strategy , sponsored by Rubrik . The InfoBrief is based on the A / NZ Ransomware Survey that polled technology and business leaders from more than 150 Australian and New Zealand organizations across a range of industries .
The survey found 18 % of A / NZ businesses had fallen victim to a ransomware attack in the past 24 months . From an industry perspective , the sectors hardest hit were banking , financial services and insurance ( BFSI ), in which 29 % of respondents said they ’ d experienced a ransomware attack , followed by the transport ( 24 %) and education ( 22 %) sectors . very different . Of those who had fallen victim to a ransomware attack , 29 % of local organizations had paid off the attackers to regain access to their data . This was prevalent in the BFSI ( 60 %) and government ( 33.3 %) sectors .
Jamie Humphrey , Managing Director at Rubrik A / NZ , said the results were a sobering reminder of how important data was to business operations in the digital age .
“ Unfortunately , faced with the prospect of either halting operations until data could be restored or paying criminal organizations to have their data returned , a significant number of local businesses thought they had no choice but to pay those holding their data hostage ,” he said .
“ Ransomware attacks are not only becoming more common , they ’ re becoming more sophisticated too – one third of local businesses that fell victim to ransomware reported that their backup data was compromised during the attack .
“ This shows how important immutable backups and mature backup regimes are to business resiliency . With a comprehensive backup strategy , operations can be up and running within an hour by simply restoring from a point-in-time before an attack without having to engage the criminals . Secure backups are the best data insurance policy businesses have against these insidious attacks .”
This sentiment was confirmed in the InfoBrief which found that 89 % of A / NZ businesses agreed that ransomware remediation was just as critical as prevention in an effective response strategy .
The findings are bolstered by the Australian Cybersecurity Center ’ s latest Annual Cyberthreat Report , which not only found that ransomware had become one of the most significant threats facing Australian businesses and governments , but also highlighted how ‘ recovering from ransomware is almost impossible without comprehensive backups .’ •
Despite bullishness on the part of respondents about their willingness to pay ransomware attackers – with only 6 % saying their organization would consider such a course of action if their data were compromised by ransomware – the reality when confronted with an attack was
68 INTELLIGENTCIO www . intelligentcio . com