7-Step Strategy To Fight Ransomware

 "Your files have been encrypted. Follow the instructions to pay us and get them back."

Ransomware demands like this appeared on many computers in 2020, and experts predict the ransomware scourge will only get worse in 2021. Why?

Ransomware provides criminals with easy income, for one; and extortionists with minimal technical skills can get in on the act. They can build code from open-source repositories, buy a package, or even use "Ransomware as a Service." Contributing to the dismal outlook are signs that attacks will grow more sophisticated, targeting specific victims and perhaps even using artificial intelligence.

With ransomware, victims most often have to pay in Bitcoin, which enables the kidnapper to remain anonymous. Attackers often force victims into making hasty decisions with threats of raising the ransom price or encrypting more files if demands aren’t met promptly.

 

 

Avoiding these risks requires advanced planning and a strategy for responding to demands and mitigating damages. Here are some cybersecurity tips:

1. IT Consultant Columbia SC says backup offline for the best prevention. Drives which are attached to a computer are as vulnerable as the main drive. A cloud backup, updated frequently, is safe from ransomware installed on a computer. Run backups as frequently as possible — and update automatically.
2. Have a policy for the worst case. Advance planning forestalls panic. Will the company refuse to pay no matter what? Will it pay if the potential loss goes beyond a certain level? The time to set a ransomware policy is when the business isn't facing an imminent threat.
3. Develop an incident response plan. Responding to a ransomware attack requires quick and effective decisions. The first step is to isolate the targeted machine to prevent further damage. The company needs to inform the FBI; local law enforcement can't do much.
4. Develop an operational contingency plan with the help of an IT Support expert. Even with good backup, an attack will cause a period of disruption. You can't restore the files till the malware is removed, or you'll just have to start over. Plan in advance how the business sustain operations while files are unavailable and computers have been pulled off the network for software repair.
5. Make sure top management is on board. Ransomware policy affects the whole company, not just IT. Executives should understand the risks and sign off on the policies.
6. Conduct security training to reduce risks. Most ransomware is spread through phishing emails and malicious or compromised websites. To minimize risk, train employees on how to recognize dubious email and not open unexpected attachments.
7. Maintain a comprehensive security strategy by hiring IT Services Columbia SC. Anti-malware is just one part. Your security infrastructure should extend protection to all endpoints, use segmentation to limit proliferation and enable quick, coordinated, adaptive responses to threats. Deploy a tightly woven fabric of integrated solutions including firewalls, IPS, antivirus software, sandbox technology and everything in between.

SpartanTec, Inc. can deliver the advantages of an integrated, collaborative security platform to prepare you in advance for the worsening ransomware forecast.

SpartanTec, Inc.
Columbia, SC 29201
(803) 408-7166
http://manageditservicescolumbia.com/

Serving: Myrtle Beach, North Myrtle Beach, Columbia, Wilmington, Fayetteville, Florence

5 IT Services That Have A Huge Effect On Your Business

 

The IT sector in the U.S. is worth nearly $1.5 trillion and it’s still growing. Global IT spending is expected to reach $4 trillion this year. This massive increase in the demand for IT services will pave the way for more IT jobs. This sector is expected to create more than 500,000 job opportunities.

The question now is what are the IT services that will be provided by such new jobs? What’s more important is to determine which infotech services companies like yours need to invest in.

5 IT Services You Need To Invest In

1.    Network, Infrastructure Procurement and Management

IT procurement firms will give all the required equipment to set up a new network. They are your go to company for getting your business programs and computers. They can create your telecommunications network such as your internet connection. The majority of procurement companies also offer asset management and maintenance services. They can upgrade your devices and fix damaged equipment. They can provide hardware equipment, software equipment, and wireless or wired connections.

2.    

Cybersecurity Solutions

Another IT service Columbia SC you need to consider is cybersecurity solution. It protects your computers and networks from online threats and digital hacks. Hackers may disrupt your business operations or extort money from you, or worse, both. They do this by changing, stealing, damaging, or destroying your confidential information. Spreading malware is only one of the methods cybercriminal use to get what they want. That’s why you need cybersecurity to make sure that your business is protected against malware and other forms of online attacks.

3.    Cloud Based Services

Cloud based services are IT support that are done from a remote facility. Cloud service providers will lease their software, hardware, as well as operating systems to their clients. They will also handle the maintenance of both the programs and equipment. It gets rid of the need for companies to have a sizable office space. It will free you from expensive equipment maintenance. The three most common types are infrastructure as a service, platform as a service, and software as a service.

4.    Internet Based Communications

IT service providers can set up internet based communications for your firm. They will maintain software and hardware that will power all these programs. They can also create your own communication programs based on the needs of your company. A few good examples are voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP), videoconferencing, and chatbots.

5.    Technical Support

Technical support is the least complicated of all IT services. But it is considered as the backbone of them all because they are the helpdesk for every technical issue encountered. It can be offsite, provided by a managed IT service provider or on-site, through your in-house IT team.

Once you have determine the appropriate IT support Myrtle Beach SC your company needs, the next thing to do is find a reliable company that can provide you with what you need. Call SpartanTec, Inc. now for more information.

Call SpartanTec, Inc. now for more information about the managed IT services we offer. 

SpartanTec, Inc.
Columbia, SC 29201
(803) 408-7166
http://manageditservicescolumbia.com/

Serving: Myrtle Beach, North Myrtle Beach, Columbia, Wilmington, Fayetteville, Florence

Why A Traditional Firewall Isn't Good Enough For You Anymore

Today, with cyber threats coming from all angles, organizations can no longer just focus on blocking threats from the outside with a traditional firewall. Organizations are as or even more likely to be impacted by the misdeeds of careless or malicious insiders as they are hackers—rendering traditional firewalls alone a shaky defense.

In a threat environment like this, organizations are better protected with an inside-out approach to cybersecurity. One of CRN’s cool, new technologies of the year, Internal Segmentation Firewalls (ISFWs) have emerged in response.

What is an ISFW?

There's a reason banks don't simply secure the perimeter and call it good. If intruders break into the bank, there’s no telling what they can walk off with if there are no inside layers of security to stop them in their tracks.

The same principles apply in a network environment. Traditional firewalls monitor general incoming and outcoming network traffic from the perimeter. But once a threat is inside, it can’t block it from compromising internal data.

That’s where the ISFW comes in. It sits at strategic points of the internal network; for example, in front of specific servers or user devices and web applications. In this way, it provides a middle layer of coverage between the network perimeter and your most valuable assets. So if a threat gets by the perimeter-based firewall, the ISFW stops it in its tracks while also providing protection from threats that originate internally.

In effect, the ISFW serves as a series of locked doors that delivers progressively tighter security as threats penetrate deeper network layers. Organizations can create low- and high-priority safety zones, storing its most sensitive information in digitally locked repositories where access is controlled by stringent security protocols. The high level of granular control and multi-layer security helps to maximize overall network performance and focus security where it’s most needed.

Other advantages include single-pane visibility, which enables the inspection of application packet streams to determine where a threat originated, where it's going, and whether it was uploaded or downloaded. This gives organizations the actionable data they need to prevent future attacks.

Why Every Organization Needs Internal Protection Today

Threats are everywhere and wear many disguises. The inside-out approach reduces exposure and damage potential by focusing on asset protection and not just guarding your perimeter from would-be evil-doers.

SpartanTec, Inc. is an Internet security services company that helps businesses get the most out of their technology. We partner with organizations to help plan, implement, monitor and manage their network security infrastructure.

SpartanTec, Inc.
Columbia, SC 29201
(803) 408-7166
http://manageditservicescolumbia.com/

Serving: Myrtle Beach, North Myrtle Beach, Columbia, Wilmington, Fayetteville, Florence

Cyber Threat Assessment: How to Find Indicators of Compromise

The threat landscape is in a constant state of evolution, and the arms race between cyberguardians and cybercriminals has been heating up dramatically over the course of the last year. An additional 20 billion IoT devices will be connected to the network by 2021, along with expansive growth in personal end user devices, forcing individuals and organizations to face an exponentially expanding attack surface bound to the borderless cyberspace. 

Set some context as to what is happening with the threat landscape today that makes threat assessment an urgent need?

Today’s digital economy connects more users, devices, applications, and data than ever before to drive business value. Billions of new IP-enabled, non-user IoT devices are transmitting vast amounts of data traversing wired and wireless access points, through both public and private networks, and across traditional and cloud infrastructures. To successfully compete in this new digital economy, organizations need to implement a tightly coordinated security strategy that can see and govern this data across an entire borderless network without compromising agility or performance. The consequences of falling behind in this arms race can be catastrophic, and has elevated the discussion of cybersecurity to the boardroom. This is a complex scenario, and as we have been saying repeatedly, complexity is the enemy of security.

How specifically can assessment help customers transition from reaction to prevention, if at all?

Secure network architectures need to constantly evolve to keep up with the latest advanced persistent threats. There are two ways to find out if your solution isn’t keeping up—wait for a breach to happen or run validation tests. A good cyber threat assessment can help you better understand:

Dark Web Assessment

Security and Threat Prevention – which application vulnerabilities are attacking your network, which malware/botnets were detected, and which devices are “at risk”— which provides better firewall assessment and security breach probability

User Productivity – which peer-to-peer, social media, instant messaging, and other apps are running — for increased application visibility and control

Network Utilization and Performance – You need to understand and measure your throughput, session, and bandwidth usage requirements during peak hours — which provides network utilization benchmarks and monitoring tests for performance optimization

Why is assessment even more critical now? What has changed?

Essentially, cyber threat assessments are a collection of threats, attacks, and data collected from live production environments of all sizes and types. “Live” is the key word. In the past, it was much easier for firewalls to detect significant threats to the network because traffic could be classified based on specific protocols, and hacker approaches were not nearly as sophisticated. Unfortunately, a growing number of network threats are designed to avoid detection by bypassing traditional firewalls and evading traditional detection tools, especially for organizations that perhaps have not yet implemented a strategic security strategy designed to find advanced threats. 

What else can assessment do?

A thorough assessment provides an important opportunity for partners to engage with customers and prospects to ensure they’re not relying on legacy systems that are no longer effective against today’s sophisticated cyberattacks that often occur across multiple vectors and stages. By offering a deeper analysis of existing or possible threats, customers are given a clear assessment of the risks to their environments. And a vendor and its partners help prioritize actions to mitigate those risks, thereby providing customers with the peace of mind that comes from knowing their critical assets are protected.  

What does SpartanTec Inc. offer?

Our Cyber Threat Assessment Program has been designed to look deep into a company’s network traffic across the entire distributed environment searching for indicators of compromise. It provides organizations with a blueprint on how to reduce risk, while at the same time making their network more efficient. For example, our most recent report, conducted over the past several months, shows that manufacturing is likely to be the next industry specifically targeted by ransomware, which is valuable information for those types of organizations. For examples you can view past reports here and here.

Call SpartanTec Inc. of Columbia today for an analysis of your networks vulnerability before it is too late.

SpartanTec, Inc.

Columbia, SC  29201

(803) 408-7166

http://manageditservicescolumbia.com/

Malware Takes Down Services At Popular Billing Company

Billtust is major player in the US financial services sector that provides a variety of billing and payment processing services for some of the biggest financial institutions in the nation. On October 17^th, they suffered a malware attack that brought all of their services to a grinding halt.
Unfortunately, the company did not notify any of their customers about the incident.

Instead, one of their customers, Wittichen Supply Company, noticed issues with Billtrust's services and posted information about the outage on their company's website. That prompted Billtrust to reach out to them and provide additional information.

Wittichen's notice reads, in part, as follows:

"We were notified late yesterday that BillTrust (our third party vendor for customer invoice and online bill payment) was the subject of a Malware attack.  BillTrust is working with federal law enforcement and cyber security firms to investigate and remediate the attack."

BillTrust went on to assure Wittichen Supply Company that none of its customers' data was compromised and that they were working around the clock to restore services. Wittichen's announcement finally did prompt the company to provide some additional information, which it made available to its customers.

On October 18^th, Billtrust posted the following overview of their services and their operational status:

• Billtrust Credit (former Credit2B) - up and operational
• Billtrust eCommerce (Second Phase) - up and operational
• Billtrust Virtual Card Capture - scheduled to be up and running on Saturday, October 19 with a plan to work through the weekend to begin catching up on back log.
• Billtrust Cash Application - Over the next 12-24 hours, we intend to bring Cash Application customers live starting with processing of lockbox and open balance files.
• Billtrust Billing & Payments - Billing and Payment websites will be turned on this evening followed by FTP connectivity. We expect card payment processing to resume this evening and ACH processing to resume on Monday, October 21 but will update you if anything changes.
• Billtrust VueBill - Please contact your account representatives for specific details.

It's good information.  It's just a pity that the company didn't see fit to start providing it until they were forced to do so by one of their own customers.  In any case, if you use Billtrust, be aware.  No further details about the attack have been forthcoming to this point.

Don't put your business or your clients at risk. Set in place safety measures to make sure that your company and customer information as well as your business network is protected against potential online threats. Call SpartanTec, Inc. in Columbia now.


SpartanTec, Inc. Columbia, SC 29201 (803) 408-7166 http://manageditservicescolumbia.com/

cities served:
Columbia, West Columbia, Cayce, St Andrews, Lexington, Oak Grove