Author Archives: DHarley

Because of time issues, I added the malware ESET calls OSX/Filecoder.E to the Specific Ransomware Families and Types page but didn’t give it an article of its own here. Since there is important news (to potential victims) from Malwarebytes, I’m repairing that omission here. MARC-ETIENNE M.LÉVEILLÉ for ESET: New crypto-ransomware hits macOS – malware that calls itself ‘Patcher’, detected […] Continue reading Patcher/Filezip/Filecoder – data recovery and naming→

My colleague Josep Albors came to a surprising conclusion in his Spanish language blog article Fake technical support is the most detected threat in Spain during January. I was so taken with the article that I generated a somewhat free translation with copious extra commentary for WeLiveSecurity: Support scams now reign in Spain. David Harley Continue reading Tech Support Scams in Spain→

Anton Ivanov for Kaspersky: A look into the Russian-speaking ransomware ecosystem. He says: One of the findings of our research is that 47 of the 60+ crypto ransomware families we’ve discovered in the last 12 months are related to Russian-speaking groups or individuals. And: While analyzing the attack statistics for 2016, we discovered that by the […] Continue reading Kaspersky researcher on Russian ransomware ecosystem→

I’m not very good at engaging with tech support scammers directly on the phone. Back in the heyday of coldcalling scammers, I would try to string them along for a while just to see if they had any new wrinkles and gambits I ought to know about. But to be honest, I tended to get […] Continue reading Jolly Roger scuppers scammers→

Ransomware isn’t the only reason to implement a good backup strategy – for home users as well as for businesses – but it’s a pretty good one, and these days you can’t afford a backup strategy that doesn’t take ransomware’s evil little ways into account. In an article for Graham Cluley’s blog, David Bisson offers […] Continue reading Backup and Ransomware→

ESET’s WeLiveSecurity blog put together an article combining commentary from Stephen Cobb, Lysa Myers and myself: Ransomware: Key insights from infosec experts. Yesterday, the site also commented on a story – Austrian hotel experiences ‘ransomware of things attack’ – that I also touched upon for ITSecurity UK: Key Card Ransomware: News versus FUD. David Harley Continue reading ESET: Key Insights & Key Card Ransomware→

Backup is a critical component of any realistic strategy for countering ransomware. I’ve been aware of Acronis in the area of backup software for some while but haven’t been familiar with their products, though I seem to remember seeing their trial versions on magazine giveaway CDs back in the days when I actually used to […] Continue reading Backup and Ransomware – a Contender?→