February 5

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Racine Hit By Ransomware; Overcoming Ransomware

Aerial View of Racine, Wisconsin to illustrate Overcoming Ransomware article

Overcoming ransomware:  the City of Racine was hit with a ransomware attack on Friday, January 31st.  They are still working to recover.  This type of attack is one of the reasons behind several recommendations we’ve been making consistently for years.

Here’s a typical scenario for overcoming ransomware:  Redirected folders store users’ documents, pictures, and desktop items on their server.  That server is then protected with a Datto appliance.  The Datto appliance backs up locally, then replicates once a day to Datto’s cloud servers.  If the data on your server is encrypted, we can “roll back” to a point in time before the encryption occurred.  Individual PC’s are not protected.  If they fall victim to encryption, we just reload them – great for overcoming ransomware.   

Aerial View of Racine, Wisconsin to illustrate Overcoming Ransomware article
Aerial View of Racine, Wisconsin to illustrate Overcoming Ransomware article. Image courtesy of Wikipedia

For clients without a server, Datto now has a similar offering for individual PC’s. With this product, there is no on-site appliance. The data is backed up directly to Datto’s cloud servers.

On another note, talk to your insurance agent about cyber insurance and find out exactly what’s covered. Damages from these attacks can be very expensive, and insurance companies are looking to limit their losses.

Oftentimes, servers are backed up to USB hard drives. This is no longer recommended because ransomware can encrypt your backups if they are reachable. If your backups are encrypted along with your server, you are out of luck!  Keeping your data in cloud storage is good, but you MUST have backups available at multiple points in time.  If it’s just a synchronized copy, those files will also be useless.

If you do not have protection from ransomware – the way of overcoming ransomware is to take precautionary measures – contact us.   Ransomware attacks are very lucrative for the attackers and will only become more common.

Additional source of news – click-through to view.

 

Mark Mullarky

President, Great Lakes Tech Services, LLC
Organizer, Wisconsin Business Owners

2607 N Grandview Blvd Suite 160E
Waukesha, WI 53188
Phone: 262.720.3668

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