Surviving a Ransomware Lockout Isn’t As Impossible as It Sounds

What would you do if you came to work one morning only to find your entire network infrastructure was encrypted by ransomware? For many businesses, this isn’t a hypothetical; they’ve lived through it and can attest to the financial setbacks and permanent data loss that can result. Depending on how well you’ve prepared, your business could be set back weeks, months, or even years… but it doesn’t have to be this way.

This is why we advocate for immutable backups and other preparation steps you can take to make your business effectively unhackable.

What Are Immutable Backups?

Hackers understand how easy it is for you to restore a backup, and that’s why they target your standard backups first during a ransomware attack.

A backup is often a business’ last resort when suffering a ransomware attack, unless they want to pay the ransom (but you shouldn’t do that under any circumstances). An immutable backup is basically a backup that doesn’t play by the same rules as your standard backup; it’s a write-once record, which means that it can’t be changed, deleted, or encrypted. Once the backup is created, it’s stored in a vault where it cannot be accessed or altered for a certain amount of time.

Even under the worst circumstances, an immutable backup should give you one last bastion of hope against a ransomware attack.

Avoiding the Crisis Entirely

A total lockout means that your business doesn’t have the luxury of waiting around.

With an image-based, immutable backup solution, you’re able to jump into action immediately. You can figure out where the breach occurred while you isolate the infected machines from your network, then determine which of your immutable snapshots minimizes data loss. Ideally, you can opt for one taken moments before the ransomware attack strikes. From there, you restore a clean image on a backup device, and your team can get right back to work while your main servers are cleaned up.

That’s how you address a ransomware attack—in a way that keeps downtime to a minimum.

Reaping the Rewards

The greatest value you get out of an immutable backup is the financial gain and peace of mind.

When you can simply tell a hacker, “No, we’re not paying you,” your business can avoid paying the ransom and the inevitable hits to your reputation that such a breach could cause. Leadership can also take more bold action, including more risk-taking, since they can move with confidence rather than fear that a single hack could bring everything crashing down. Remember, it’s not about if you become a target, but when, and businesses that prepare now don’t pay the price later.

You need to understand that you are a target, even if you don’t want to be, and that protecting your business is ultimately your responsibility. However, it doesn’t have to be; all you have to do is call us and we’ll take this problem off your plate entirely. Give WatchPoint Solutions a call today at (848) 202-8860 to learn more.