Ransomware is still the number one threat for businesses in Europe. Hackers have upped their game by attacking more frequently but demanding less ransom, says the latest European State of the Channel Ransomware Report from Datto.
Compared to the global ransomware report results, which found that 1 in 4 ransomware attacks are reported, only 16% of European victims report such attacks to the authorities. However, Datto believes that ransomware attacks may be coming to a crossroads – thanks to savvy businesses mitigating against those threats using business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) and other solutions.
In the first half of 2018, 42% of MSPs saw their clients suffer multiple attacks in a single day and, again, this is higher than the global average of 35%. In addition, ransomware infections in the cloud continue to increase, with 49% of cloud-based malware infections targeting Office 365.
Ransomware attacks can be crippling for smaller businesses, and the associated system downtime is a particular problem as it costs European businesses around £26,300 on average. Datto’s latest report found that the cost of this downtime is 12x greater than the actual cost of ransom requested, exceeding the global average. Hence the worrying trend that ransomware may actually be working for the perpetrators.
The report surveyed nearly 300 managed service providers (MSPs), Datto partners and customers, across Europe.
The full report can be downloaded here:
