How to defend against the ransomware

On May 12, an unsuspecting user clicked open an email attachment. That was essentially that. A veritable tsunami of maliciousness was let loose on to the user’s computer network — and most of the world.

Going much beyond the usual mischief that virus cause, WannaCry as the infection has been aptly termed, has quickly escalated to a full-fledged cyber crime, encrypting essential files, crippling systems and bringing services to their knees and demanding money to restore things back to normal. Individuals can be vulnerable too. Here are a few things you can do to protect yourself against this most viscous of attacks.

Immediately install updates: Windows has such frequent updates, taking away precious minutes from a work day and distracting a user from the job at hand, that users typically opt to delay the update. That is the one thing one must not do. Updates contain critical security patches that are well worth the time they take by inoculating you against trouble. Microsoft has even issued a patch for the old Windows XP support for which has otherwise been phased out now, because of the seriousness of the WannaCry worm.

Take clean backups: Although services require files that are moving along a system on a constant basis, the very least that can be done is to back up important data somewhere very safe. Backups must be frequent and clean, making sure they are done when a system is healthy and protected with anti-virus software. It is easy enough to infect backups.

Never click on unknown links: No matter how many times this has been said, users continue to click before they think.

Did a sender promise to send you a link or attachment? Is there a specific and meaningful explanation accompanying the mail or message with which it arrives? If not never, before or after WannaCry, click to find out what it is all about. If it is important, the sender will personally get back to you.

Do not pay: Experts around the world are advising users to decline paying the cyber criminals to restore systems to normal. Not only is there no guarantee that this can or will be done, paying only encourages this and similar episodes to flourish.

For now, WannaCry has begun to slow and an expected second wave of attacks has not taken place.

But it is always advised to take proactive measures against malware and ransomware.