5 Building Blocks of Cyber Resilience

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The rising tide of ransomware attacks set records last year despite efforts by law enforcement agencies around the world.

Jun 04, 2024

Cybersecurity

The rising tide of ransomware attacks set records last year despite efforts by law enforcement agencies around the world. Researchers monitoring this cybercrime favorite have detected increases in malicious activities from 2022 to 2023 as high as 50%. According to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) one hack alone last year compromised more than 3000 U.S.-based organizations and another 8000 globally.

But the news isn’t all disturbing. During the last 12 months, there have been signs of progress in the fight against cyber extortion. Studies show that a growing number of ransomware victims are refusing to pay. One research team found that in Q4-2023 the proportion of afflicted firms agreeing to pay ransoms dropped 29% to a record low.

Why? Analysts believe these are the reasons:

Increasing cybersecurity awareness and education, such as threat notifications.
Refined and rehearsed incident response plans.
Persistent security diligence, such as incursion monitoring.
Consistent backup and disaster recovery (BUDR) processes and practices.
Sharpening the focus of remediation efforts on root causes and vulnerabilities, such as human error.

Taken together, these measures deepen and fortify cyber resilience, a company’s ability to anticipate disruptions from catastrophes like ransomware, improve at avoiding them over time, optimize operational response in the event of breaches and then recover at maximum speed.