Results from our Survey
With ransomware hitting the headlines, we ask what GCs can do to prepare for the inevitability of a cyber attack.
On 7 May 2021, Colonial Pipeline, the largest petroleum pipeline in the US, was shut down following a cyber attack. It remained closed for five days, causing panic buying, fuel shortages and national security soul-searching. For cybersecurity experts, the most surprising element of this episode was that a key part of US infrastructure was not brought down by the actions of a hostile state (at least directly), but by a small group of cyber-criminals deploying a devastating form of online extortion software: ransomware.
After gaining access to a company or individual’s system, the attacker will make files inaccessible in some way. At the lower end of the scale, the malicious programme may simply lock the computer, an easily fixable situation for an IT professional and no great problem for a large company. But when deployed by more sophisticated attackers, the software will encrypt the victim’s files so effectively that recovering them without the decryption key is virtually impossible.
