What is a ransomware attack?

Ransomware is a type of malware that intends to disrupt a victim’s system or render it inaccessible until the victim pays a ransom to recover its system. Ransomware achieves this by encrypting the files on the victim’s computer, thereby restricting access to these files. It then demands a ransom payment in exchange for the decryption key.

How does ransomware work?

For ransomware to take effect, it first needs to infiltrate the victim’s computer. Ransomware can be delivered through infected USB drives, malicious email attachments, compromised network connections, and more. After the ransomware delivery process, the ransomware must release the malicious code to execute on the victim’s system. The malicious code makes the system inaccessible and prompts the user to pay the ransom to decrypt. Here is the kill chain of the ransomware attack, the series of steps the attacker takes to carry out the attack.

Let’s discuss the steps of the ransomware kill chain.

1. Reconnaissance: The process of gathering information about the target, like their system’s vulnerabilities, emails, phone numbers, and IP addresses.

2. Weaponization: The process of adding malicious payloadAny script written with the intention of causing any malicious activity. to the deliverable.

3. Delivery: The process of delivering the deliverable to the target’s system

4. Exploitation: The process of exploiting a vulnerability in the target’s system to install the malicious payload.

5. Installation: The process of installing malicious payload on the target’s system.

6. Command and control: The process of creating the communication channel between the target system and the attacker’s system.

7. Execution: The process of executing the malicious payload. In this case, it means encrypting the system’s files.

8. Extortion and ransom: The result of the execution means having access to the system and prompting the target for ransom.

Ransomware usually works by using public key cryptography. The public key cryptography works by generating private and public key pairs for the interacting entities. The attacker uses the public key to encrypt the user’s system. To decrypt the files, the user would require the private key. The attacker holds the system hostage and asks for ransom for the victim to get the private key to recover the accessibility of the system.

Motive and impact of the attack

The ransomware attack is carried out with multiple intentions. The first and most common intention is the financial motive of attackers. The attackers can benefit significantly from the substantial ransom amounts, and in the modern cryptocurrency world, the attacker can also ensure anonymity while demanding and receiving the ransom amounts. The use of cryptocurrency can also make it hard to determine the track followed by the money.

The ransomware attacks also have other motives besides the financial motive of the attacker. The attacker may want to take down a company by halting its resources, causing substantial final losses, losing its customers due to unavailability, and using the system to defame the target company by gaining admin privileges after getting access.

The attacker may also use access privileges to retrieve confidential data even after getting a ransom, and use the confidential information to blackmail the target company into paying more money.

How to respond to a ransomware attack

The most accessible and straightforward response a company at stake would take would be to pay the ransom and get the access back. However, what is the assurance that the attacker would give the victim the private key or access back?

Here are a few essential response steps that the victim could take.

No ransom payment

The risk with ransom payment is that there needs to be an integrity analysis of the deal. There is a possibility that the attacker only bluffs about getting the key after paying the ransom. The safest step is not to pay the ransom. Instead, try to track the malware’s source and detect its motive.

Reporting the incident

The most essential step towards responding to an attack is reporting the attack to legal authorities and law enforcement firms. The benefit of doing so would be that the attack and type of occurrence would be recorded. Secondly, law enforcement agencies can take legal action against the attacker and may help them devise solutions against similar ransomware attacks in the future.

Seeking professional help

Hiring cybersecurity incident response professionals to mitigate the incident might be the solution. Cybersecurity professionals do behaviour analysis of the ransomware and try to recover the system’s control. The professionals use the following ways:

1. Predict: Predicting the decryption key using brute force and behaviour analysis.

2. Find: Find the location of the decryption key within the system. In some cases, the decryption key resides somewhere within the system.

3. Resolve: Analyze the potential losses and devise a solution to minimize losses.

Safe future practices

Other than these solutions, the victim or, in general, any party can adopt these safe practices to lower the chance of exploiting the system. Some functional controls to reduce the probability of attack would be:

• Use web and email security

• Run scans of external drives

• Use safe network connections

• Use anti-virus and anti-malware solutions

• Try to avoid malicious sites

• Use authentic and up-to-date software

Test your understanding

Let’s see the level of comprehension you gained from this Answer. Solve this match the column challenge.