Cybercrime, ransomware: “the next step”

The digital revolution which has affected our societies for more than twenty years has reshaped our professional world and our profession. We continue to be more efficient, more competitive, more flexible and innovative. We care for, learn, work and socialize through constantly evolving digital languages. The result is an ever-growing digital dependence.

The health crisis has naturally reinforced this cyberdependence, highlighted our digital divides, but also our ability to defend ourselves, or on the contrary to be attacked. Today, the findings are clear: Anssi figures show an outright increase of 255% in the number of software or ransomware attacks over the past year. These affect all trades, although the industrial sector and hospitals are particularly affected.

Still in the understanding of this phenomenon, the laws in force seem insufficient, and many points are discussed: the risks related to the payment of the ransom, the feeding of a pernicious business, the reputation of the companies and their capacity to protect their employees and their customers. Previously, the subject of all passions among CIOs, he became the bête noire of executives.

The cost of a cyber attack is double

The cost of a cyberattack is twofold. In addition to that linked to the loss of sensitive data, there is a second aspect, that of the loss of production. An attack can turn into months of inactivity, and thousands of employees worried about when they can get back to work.

The challenges of cybersecurity are multiple, they also have several dimensions; technical, conceptual, human and legislative.

Users often focus on IT tools like antivirus, firewall, cryptography, etc. To prevent, the anti-virus component is essential but not sufficient. It is also important to conceptualize suitable risk management methods. To a prevention solution must be added a survival kit to ensure the continuity of its operation.

Recovery solutions exist to allow teams to continue working on an earlier version saved every day on the workstations. I call on companies to tackle the issue of the loss of activity associated with extinguishing fires, and the economic value it represents. It is now time to think about protecting yourself, but also more importantly to intelligently plan the next move.