What Is Ransomware? | IBM
Ransomware is a type of malware that holds a victim’s sensitive data or device hostage, threatening to keep it locked—or worse—unless the victim pays a ransom to the attacker. The earliest ransomware attacks simply demanded a ransom in exchange for the encryption key needed to regain access to the affected data or use of the infected device.
How to Recover From a Ransomware Attack | IBM
Photograph the ransom note. Before moving forward with anything else, take a photo of the ransom note—ideally by photographing the screen of the affected device with a separate device like a smartphone or camera. The photo will expedite the recovery process and help when filing a police report or a possible claim with your insurance company.
What Is Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS)? | IBM
Ransomware as a service (RaaS) is a cybercrime business model in which ransomware developers sell ransomware code or malware to other hackers, called “affiliates,” who then use the code to initiate their own ransomware attacks. Ransomware-as-a-service arrangements are popular with cybercriminals. Ransomware remains a common cyberthreat ...
What is a Cyberattack? | IBM
Ransomware attacks can disable a system until the company pays the attacker a ransom. According to one report (link resides outside ibm.com), the average ransom payment is USD 812,360. In addition to directly harming the target, cyberattacks can have a host of secondary costs and consequences related to detecting, responding to, and remediating ...
Ransomware Protection Solutions | IBM
To prevent and combat modern ransomware attacks and malware threats, IBM uses insight from 800 TB of threat activity data, information on more than 17 million spam and phishing attacks, and reputation data on nearly 1 million malicious IP addresses from a network of 270 million endpoints. AI for proactive ransomware detection.
What Is a DDoS Attack? | IBM
A DDoS attack floods websites with malicious traffic, making applications and other services unavailable to legitimate users. Unable to handle the volume of illegitimate traffic, the target slows to a crawl or crashes altogether, making it unavailable to legitimate users. DDoS attacks are part of the broader category, denial-of-service attacks ...
What is Cyber Insurance? | IBM
For example, the average ransomware attack costs USD 4.54 million, not including ransom payments. Cyber insurance policies arose to close this coverage gap. By covering ransom payments, malware remediation and other costs, cyber policies can help companies limit their damage, recover more quickly and raise their overall level of cyber resilience.
What is IT Security? - IBM
IT security, which is short for information technology security, is the practice of protecting an organization’s IT assets—computer systems, networks, digital devices, data—from unauthorized access, data breaches, cyberattacks and other malicious activity. The scope of IT security is broad and often involves a mix of technologies and ...
The History of Malware - IBM
Nov 6, 2023 · In order to regain access to these encrypted resources, the makers of CryptoLocker requested a ransom of two bitcoins, which at the time were valued at roughly 715 USD. Luckily, in 2014 the Department of Justice, working with international agencies, managed to seize control of the malicious botnet and decrypt the hostage data free of charge.
What Is Scareware? | IBM
What is scareware? Scareware is a type of social engineering scam that uses fear to trick people into downloading malware, losing money or handing over personal data. In the classic example, scareware alerts the victim to a virus on their device, then tries to sell the victim a fake antivirus software that does nothing or turns out to be ...