Ransomware by the numbers: Reassessing the threat’s global impact

Ransomware by the numbers: Reassessing the threat’s global impact

Kaspersky has been following the ransomware landscape for years. In the past, we’ve published yearly reports on the subject: PC ransomware in 2014-2016, Ransomware in 2016-2017, and Ransomware and malicious crypto miners in 2016-2018. In fact, in 2019, we chose ransomware as the story of the year, upon noticing the well-known threat was shifting its attention to municipalities. In the 2010s, with campaigns like WannaCry and NotPetya, ransomware became mainstream news. However, starting in 2018, we began noticing something else: the statistics for the overall number of ransomware detections were on a steep decline. What was happening? Was ransomware, in fact, a dying species of malware?


For anyone following the news in the infosecurity community, this seemed unlikely. In 2019 and 2020, stories of ransomware attacks made front-page headlines, from Maze attacking LG to the infamous APT group Lazarus adding ransomware to its arsenal. In the United States alone in 2020, ransomware hit more than 2,300 government entities, healthcare facilities and schools, according to the security company Emsisoft.


So, what’s the story?


Ransomware hasn’t disappeared; the threat has just undergone a fundamental shift. Widespread ransomware campai ..

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