A recent study by the company Kaspersky, in over 5.000 people στον Καναδά και τις ΗΠΑ, αποκαλύπτει ότι παρόλο που στις μέρες μας τα ransomware είναι τα πιο διαdata και επικίνδυνα malware, πολλοί χρήστες δεν έχουν ιδέα τι είναι και τι κάνει.
And while cyber security officials sweat just thinking they might fall victim to blackmail, 43% of cyber users researchs stated that they do not know what it is ransomware.
Kaspersky says that respondents were more afraid of other malware categories, such as viruses, trojans, spyware, etc, and that only 16% of about 5.000 users said they were afraid of ransomware.
There was also an extra 9% that ransomware is about hacking into a social media account for ransom.
This lack of knowledge about what a ransomware is, explains how a great part of the users have never addressed the issue. One-quarter of the survey participants said the best method to clean a ransomware infection is to disconnect the computer from the Internet, a move that actually does not help at all.
In addition, the 15% of Americans and the 17% of Canadians believe that disabling the device will solve their problem. This practice may prove dangerous for certain infections, especially if ransomware files encrypt at that particular moment, resulting in the cessation of the encryption process in some cases leading to permanent damage to the data.
Of course, for some ransomware categories, this technique could save the user's data, but the whole logic looks more like Russian roulette, and it is good you do not.
Also, in a related survey question, 53% of users reported that they are willing to permanently lose their data rather than pay a ransom. This result is consistent with the findings of a similar study by Bitdefender.
So, it's no wonder that so many people fall victim to ransomware infections. Most people barely know what it is, let alone how to prevent and how to stay away from such dangers.
