The Middle East and North Africa have accounted for 4.75% and 1.75% respectively of global ransomware threats.
Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cybersecurity solutions, is committed to protecting customers and consumers against today’s greatest security threats and has blocked more than 100 million ransomware threats for their customers in the last six months, with 99% of threats blocked from email and web traffic. Recognising the growth and impact of ransomware, the company has taken a holistic approach to helping customers defend against ransomware, and is delivering:
- Ransomware readiness assessment that helps businesses of all sizes understand vulnerabilities in their security posture and provides concrete actions they can take
- Ransomware removal tools that help both consumers and businesses that have been impacted by ransomware recover their data
- Product enhancements to bolster ransomware protection across four key layers of security, and provide enterprise-wide visibility of ransomware
“Ransomware threats are constantly evolving and no business is immune,” said Cherif Djerboua, Regional Tech Leader, Trend Micro.
“As security experts, we encourage everyone to download our free tools and inform users on the preventive measures and ways to tackle the situation when affected. We recommend organisations to raise awareness and train their employees regularly on these preventive measures, like backing up data and what must be done when they encounter ransomware in emails or compromised sites.
“This helps to avoid being the victim of ransomware, as paying the ransom money does not guarantee that you can recover your data. There have been numerous reports of attackers asking for another ransom following the initial payment.”
Enterprise ransomware protection
Trend Micro delivers ransomware protection across 4 key layers:
- Email: Trend Micro delivers deeper inspection than traditional email gateways for both on premise and cloud-based email, such as Microsoft Office 365. This detects and blocks spear phishing emails and attachments or URLs that carry ransomware – the most common way ransomware infects an organisation
- Endpoint: Trend Micro delivers a full range of next-gen endpoint protection capabilities to detect and block ransomware, including the shielding of unpatched vulnerabilities, application control and behavior monitoring to keep an eye out for suspicious activity such as encryption of multiple files, with the ability to halt encryption in its tracks and isolate the infected endpoint
- Network: Trend Micro continually monitors all network traffic, all network ports and more than 100 network protocols to detect ransomware and advanced threats
- Server: Trend Micro protects servers, whether physical, virtual or in the cloud, with suspicious activity detection and prevention, vulnerability shielding to stop ransomware from exploiting known server software vulnerabilities and lateral movement detection to prevent ransomware from spreading to other servers
Trend Micro delivers enhanced central visibility of how ransomware is impacting an organisation – identifying ransomware delivered through email, malicious URLs, a network breach or server compromise. This enables incidents to be more rapidly investigated and resolved, as well as enables ransomware trends to be tracked over time so that an organisation’s overall security posture can be improved.
Ransomware protection for small business
No size of business is immune to ransomware and that’s why Trend Micro’s small business solution, Worry-Free Services Advanced, delivers capabilities that protect against it:
- Email: Trend Micro detects and blocks malicious emails, attachments and URLs with malware scanning, web reputation and sandbox malware analysis
- Endpoint: Trend Micro provides endpoint protection that includes capabilities specific to ransomware such as behaviour monitoring to stop suspicious activity associated with ransomware such as the rapid encryption of multiple files
Worry-Free Services Advanced is designed specifically for small businesses as a cloud-based solution, with simple but powerful protection that minimises day to day management.
Ransomware protection for home users
Trend Micro warns consumers ransomware can arrive on their computer from compromised websites, spammed emails, or wrapped in other malware, holding precious files and photos until the user pays a fee to the cybercriminals who hold them hostage. Ransom prices can reach US$600 or more.
