54% Of Organizations Suffered Ransomware Attack Last Year

Almost 54 percent of organizations had suffered a ransomware attack in the last one year, as per a recent survey report. The survey had covered 2,700 IT professionals across the globe and has been carried out by cyber security firm Sophos.

The survey, details of which have been published in a Sophos whitepaper, says that most organizations were hit more than once in the last year and thus the average number of ransomware attacks per organization happens to be two per year.

The report also discusses the costs that ransomware attacks cause companies. It states that every single such attack costs companies $133,000. In the case of some infections, which happen to be of a more widespread nature (this seems to have happened with 5 percent of the respondents), the costs incurred have ranged between $1.3 to $6.6 million. The cost estimations include the ransom paid, the losses incurred due to lost work hours and equipment downtime, the network costs plus the lost business opportunities.

The Sophos survey also covers other things. It discusses the countries and the sectors that have been affected the most. As per the survey report, the ransomware attacks are not equally spread out across the globe, some countries seem to be hit more than others. The country that has been infected the most is India, which is followed by Mexico, the US, Canada and South Africa.

Coming to the industries that have been impacted the most, the survey report discusses those for which the impact has gone above the 54 percent median. The healthcare industry tops the list; 76 percent of respondents representing the industry have said they had suffered a ransomware attack in the past one year. The next slot has been taken by energy, oil, gas, and utilities; here it’s 65 percent while the services industry comes third with 59 percent. The next in line are retail, distribution, and transport with 58 percent and IT, technology, and telecoms with 55 percent.

Discussing the findings, Sophos has pointed out that in today’s scenario all kinds of companies, big or small, is a target. An analysis of the numbers shows that almost half of the organizations that have 100 to 1000 employees have fallen victim to ransomware attacks in the last year. Coming to the next level- companies having between 1001 to 5000 employees- it has been 58 percent; yes, 58 percent of such companies have been hit.

Sophos, the company that has carried out the survey and published the whitepaper, points out that ransomware criminals seem to see the healthcare industry as a soft target, especially because of the aging IT infrastructure, the security holes and the restricted resources for improving IT security for most firms in the healthcare industry. Consequently, many such organizations end up paying ransom to get their systems back on track once they are attacked.