Cybercrime is rampant and the New Year began with two big unanswered questions on the cyber crime front: Was there a Russian influence on the U.S. presidential election? How did hackers gain access to 1.5 billion Yahoo accounts?
There are no definitive answers for the questions and there is enough data which suggest that 2017 will be no less digitally perilous for most people as last year. Businesses will continue to grapple with the spread of ransomware in the form of malicious software that encrypts and holds computer files hostage until money gets paid, typically in the form of untraceable bitcoins. It does seem that out techno-dependent society will become increasingly vulnerable to the criminal activities of the hackers.
"Someone asked me the other day how much progress we've made on cybersecurity," said James Andrew Lewis, director of the Strategic Technologies Program at the Center for Strategic & International Studies. "The answer is not so much," he said, reported TopTech News.
A consensus has been reached by the intelligence community that Moscow was behind cyber attacks on Hillary Clinton's campaign for the purpose of helping ensure an election victory by Donald Trump. It is now the responsibility of the investigators to determine the scope of what happened and what can be done to prevent future election tampering from abroad, reported LA Times.
The Yahoo hacks are simpler to understand. It shows consumers the ongoing threat to people's privacy and digital livelihoods. It might be uneasy to say but nothing is safe. A person's email, their personal information, photos or files which are stored online can be accessible to anyone with the skills and wherewithal to grab it.
Ransomware is a particularly insidious problem. IBM reported recently that 70 percent of businesses infected with ransomware have quietly paid off the perpetrators to regain access to their files and data systems. In half the cases, the ransom was at least $10,000.
Among consumers, IBM's study found that more than half of those surveyed would be willing to pay to recover financial data and 43 percent would cough up some cash to unlock a mobile device. Ransom demands involving individuals typically run a few hundred dollars.
As a proof of how far the hackers can go, it is reported that there is a new ransomware racket called Popcorn Time. After encrypting the victim's computer files and demanding a bitcoin payout, the software offers another choice: help infect the computers of at least two of your friends. If this is done and the hacker is paid off, the victim receives a free software key to unlock their own files.
It is very important that the people become more cautious. It is a known fact that as security measures grow stronger, so too do the cunning and sophistication of hackers.
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