This month’s Jargon Buster will focus on a very topical subject after being in the news several times over the past few weeks, Ransomware.

You will likely have heard the word Ransomware a lot in the press, particularly relating to the ‘WannaCry’ cyberattack on the NHS, but you may not know exactly what this means and importantly if your computer is at risk. Ransomware is a type of Malware, malware is short for malicious software and is a programme designed to damage or interfere with your computer system. There are different types of malware but at the risk of overcomplicating this post we will be focussing specifically on Ransomware. Ransomware may infect your system in a number of ways, most often disguising itself as a legitimate looking file that when opened goes to work infecting your machine and encrypting your files.

If you open a file containing Ransomware you may find your computer displays a lockscreen instructing you to pay a fine to ‘unlock’ your files. Sometimes these locked screens appear to be from the police or other official sources. In the case of the ‘WannaCry’ the cybercriminals were demanding $300 worth of bitcoin, the online currency. The only way to unlock these encrypted files is with the key but even if a fine is paid there is still no guarantee that the files will be unlocked and it also sends a dangerous message to cybercriminals who may see this as a lucrative way to extort money.

So how can you protect yourself from Ransomware? Like most things the best defence is a good offense so make sure you keep up to date with operating system updates and the latest patches released designed to protect against these attack. Backing up your files so they can be recovered once your computer has been cleaned is also good practice but it is important that this backup is a disconnected backup as the Ransomware files are designed to spread and a hard drive plugged in and connected to your PC will also be infected by a Ransomware attack.

If you are worried about your computer security and virus protection you can always contact us and someone from the team *cough Allan * will be able to advise on the best ways to keep your computer safe.