What happens when you click on the wrong email? or text? (the above email is some kind of fake email – it did not come from CVS, and once clicked on sent the unwitting user to someplace the hacker wanted) thh last image of an “Outlook WebApp” is a landing page hackers create to get your information,
Will you actually get the Nigerian prince’s money? Or some other weird scam to tell you that you won some money and you will get it only if you click here.
Instead of getting that coupon or otherwise, you will get some malware and if you are lucky your computer will only slow down. More likely you will get this:
Or at least a version of the above.
So now that your system is ‘encrypted’ what happens? Can you unencrypt if you pay the criminals the money?
Do you think there is a warranty when you try to unencrypt your files? Definitely not, and more likely you will never see any of your files again. So I hope you have a valid backup that is not on your system (a backup on your system may also be encrypted).
You need a backup ‘offline’ which means a tape, CD, or other drive that is not connected to your computer system.
What happens if you click and your files are encrypted, the files are not backed up – you don’t want to risk paying them (and get nothing). So now if nothing happens your files are gone. Now what? Well, to get your computer to any usable position, you have to reload the operating system and install software. So now you also have to think, what can I do to prevent from this happening again? Instead of worrying about these types of things… some people opt to just change their business. In other words you clicked and went out of business.
Maybe next time you click on something think about that for a second.
So the thing to do is to be pro-active, test your devices, test your backup, test the ability of your system to be able to handle attacks.
Contact Us to discuss.