We have been alerting all of our readers to the nightmares of ransomware, and that the healthcare industry is a prime target.
Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, a new strain of ransomware, known as Jigsaw, originally known as BitcoinBlackkmailer.exe, was reportedly built on March 23, 2016 and released within a week. The way it works is that if a victim downloads the malware, a malicious code encrypts the user’s files, sets up a scary locked screen with the face of “Billy the Puppet” from the movie Saw, tells the user that the files are encrypted, and that they are being held to a ransom, to be paid in virtual currency, such as Bitcoin.
What is really scary about this form of ransomware is that the threat is not only that all of the files are encrypted, but after “Billy the Puppet” is displayed on the screen, the victims are told that if they don’t pay the ransom, files will be deleted every hour.
According to report, only a few files are deleted within the first 24 hours, but then several thousand files are deleted every day until payment is made. The files are deleted while the victim is watching because if the victim attempts to close the system or turn off the computer, they are told that 1000 files will be deleted when they start the computer back up “as a punishment.”
The malware is reportedly for sale on Tor for $139, but security experts note that the malware is not that sophisticated and can be reverse engineered and analyzed. However, it is important to note how creative hackers are getting to make our lives protecting data more difficult.
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