New Ryuk Ransomware Techniques Underscore How Fast Attackers Switch Gears
OXFORD, United Kingdom, Oct. 14, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Sophos , a global leader in next-generation cybersecurity, today announced the findings of its global survey, "Cybersecurity: T he Human Challenge ", which reveals that organizations are never the same after being hit by ransomware. In particular, the confidence of IT managers and their approach to battling cyberattacks differ significantly depending on whether or not their organization has been attacked by ransomware.
For instance, IT managers at organizations hit by ransomware are nearly three times as likely to feel "significantly behind" when it comes to understanding cyberthreats, compared to their peers in organizations that were unaffected (17% versus 6%).
More than one third (35%) of ransomware victims said that recruiting and retaining skilled IT security professionals was their single biggest challenge when it comes to cybersecurity, compared with just 19% of those who hadn't been hit.
When it comes to security focus, the survey found that ransomware victims spend proportionally less time on threat prevention (42.6%) and more time on response (27%) compared to those who haven't been hit (49% and 22% respectively), diverting resources towards dealing with incidents rather than stopping them in the first place.
"The difference in resource priorities could indicate that ransomware victims have more incidents to deal with overall. However, it could equally indicate that they are more alert to the complex, multi-stage nature of advanced attacks and therefore put greater resource into detecting and responding to the tell-tale signs that an attack is imminent," said Chester Wisniewski, principal research scientist at Sophos.
The fact that ransomware attackers continue to evolve their tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) contributes to pressure on IT security teams, as evidenced by SophosLabs Uncut's article, "Inside a New Ryuk Ransomware Attack ". The article deconstructs a recent attack involving Ryuk ransomware. Sophos incident responders found that the Ryuk attackers used updated versions of widely available and legitimate tools to compromise a targeted network and deploy ransomware. Unusually, the attack progressed at great speed – within three and a half hours of an employee opening a malicious phishing email attachment, the attackers were already actively conducting network reconnaissance. Within 24 hours, the attackers had access to a domain controller and were preparing to launch Ryuk.
"Our investigation of the recent Ryuk ransomware attack highlights what defenders are up against. IT security teams need to be on full alert 24 hours a day, seven days a week and have a full grasp of the latest threat intelligence on attacker tools and behaviors. The survey findings illustrate clearly the impact of these near-impossible demands. Among other things, those hit by ransomware were found to have severely undermined confidence in their own cyberthreat awareness. However, their ransomware experiences also appear to have given them a greater appreciation of the importance of skilled cybersecurity professionals, as well as a sense of urgency about introducing human-led threat hunting to better understand and identify the latest attacker behavior," said Wisniewski. "Whatever the reasons, it is clear that when it comes to security, an organization is never the same again after being hit by ransomware."
The full report, "Inside a New Ryuk Ransomware Attack", is available on SophosLabs Uncut , where Sophos researchers regularly publish their latest research and breakthrough findings, such as Maze leveraging Ragnar Locker . Threat researchers can follow SophosLabs Uncut in real time on Twitter at @SophosLabs .
About the Survey
The "Cybersecurity: T he Human Challenge " survey was conducted by Vanson Bourne, an independent specialist in market research, in January and February 2020. The survey interviewed 5,000 IT decision makers in 26 countries, in the US, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, France, Germany, the UK, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, Poland, the Czech Republic, Turkey, India, Nigeria, South Africa, Australia, China, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines and UAE. All respondents were from organizations with between 100 and 5,000 employees.
Additional Resources
For more information on how to identify that ransomware attackers have you in their sights, read the SophosLabs article Five signs you're about to be attacked . Learn more about ransomware behavior in the Sophos ransomware playbook: How Ransomware Attacks Read the latest security and company news on Naked Security and on Sophos News Connect with Sophos on Twitter , LinkedIn , Facebook , Spiceworks , and YouTube About Sophos
As a worldwide leader in next-generation cybersecurity, Sophos protects more than 400,000 organizations of all sizes in more than 150 countries from today's most advanced cyber threats. Powered by SophosLabs – a global threat intelligence and data science team – Sophos' cloud-native and AI-powered solutions secure endpoints (laptops, servers and mobile devices) and networks against evolving cyberattack techniques, including ransomware, malware, exploits, data exfiltration, active-adversary breaches, phishing, and more. Sophos Central, a cloud-native management platform, integrates Sophos' entire portfolio of next-generation products, including the Intercept X endpoint solution and the XG next-generation firewall, into a single "synchronized security" system accessible through a set of APIs. Sophos has been driving a transition to next-generation cybersecurity, leveraging advanced capabilities in cloud, machine learning, APIs, automation, managed threat response, and more, to deliver enterprise-grade protection to any size organization. Sophos sells its products and services exclusively through a global channel of more than 53,000 partners and managed service providers (MSPs). Sophos also makes its innovative commercial technologies available to consumers via Sophos Home. The company is headquartered in Oxford, U.K. More information is available at www.sophos.com
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Hanah Johnson
sophos@marchcomms.com