Risk & Business Magazine Cal LeGrow Risk & Business Magazine Fall 2017 | Page 6

RANSOMWARE
Ransomware:
Chances Are, You’re Not Protected
BY: JOHN SEARY, OWNER, PC &
NETWORK SOLUTIONS, INC
THE BEGINNING
Your day starts like any other, until you get The
Phone Call: “Something’s not working with the
appointment scheduler. It says the file is not
found.”
But it isn’t just one call; it’s many: “I can’t get
into Simply Accounting. I need to get payroll
done.” “There is a message on my screen I’ve
never seen before. Something about Crypto.”
What you first hope is a problem with a simple
fix suddenly becomes something else when
employees discover their data is no longer
accessible. The wrenching in your gut gets
worse when you realise the gist of the message
now appearing on a computer. Your data is gone
until you pay a ransom.
Your thoughts go to the last time you had a
backup done. Is it recent? Did it work? Someone
logs into the server to start restoring files. You
wonder if a day of lost data entry is recoverable.
Then you get the bad news: “The backup
is encrypted too. We have nothing we can
restore.”
You feel all the blood draining from your face
and need to sit down.
THE FALLOUT
Everyone is now idle, except the customers who
expect you to be open for business as usual.
They keep calling, but no one can help them.
You see employees’ time being wasted and
customers being forced to go elsewhere. You
have no idea how to start recovering your
business.
Your thoughts turn to what everyone will
think. You immediately see no one will have
6