In a blog post, Yaelle Harel, technical product marketing manager at Check Point, wrote, “Falling victim to a Ryuk ransomware attack is exceptionally costly to an organization. The operators of the Ryuk demand a high ransom and in some cases, even paying the ransom is not enough to regain a company’s access to sensitive or valuable data.”
Ryuk is ransomware, a form of malware that encrypts a victim’s files, utilized by the TrickBot gang in targeted attacks against organizations around the world, forcing them to pay extremely high ransom payments in Bitcoin.
“As a victim of a ransomware attack, you are on the horns of a dilemma. You have to choose between paying the ransom and self-recovery,” he noted.
This is certainly not the type of problem, any person or organization wants to encounter. Deciding not to pay or make a ransomware payment is difficult and risky. There is a possibility that a person or entity could end up violating Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) regulations by making ransomware payments to cybercriminals who are included in the agency’s sanction list.
