2016 has proven to be a banner year for Ransomware. The year kicked off with a series of ransomware attacks on a trio of hospitals including the well-publicized incident at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center which forced its IT staff to shut down the network while coerced administration officials agreed to pay a $17,000 bitcoin ransom. The year is culminating in dramatic fashion as well as thousands of San Francisco commuters got to ride for free as a result of a ransomware attack on the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency which infected 2,112 computers and took its light rail transit system offline for more than 24 hours.
The idea of altering the files of a computer system through some sort of malware is nothing new. It was not uncommon back in the 90’s to get infected with some sort of virus that would delete your files. It was hard to understand the motivation for such types of attacks other than mere nefarious degenerate behavior by some obnoxious individuals with coding skills. Today however, the alteration of files is big business, and as the saying goes, money changes everything.