6 Tips To Protect Your Company’s Data
From Ransomware
Ransomware can quickly cripple a business and the problem appears to be growing, as evidenced recently when the U.S. government issued a warning about Bad Rabbit, a ransomware attack that spread through Russia, the Ukraine and other countries.
Such attacks can be costly for businesses because ransomware infects a computer, blocks access to computer files, and demands that money be paid before the computer is “released.”
If there’s no data backup, the business could be in serious trouble.
“Most attacks are against financial, medical and retail business sectors,” says Penny Garbus, co-founder of Soaring Eagle Consulting Inc. (www.SoaringEagle.guru) and co-author of Mining New Gold – Managing your Business Data.
“The ransoms are usually $1,000 and most companies pay it. In some cases these days, though, money isn’t the goal. I think they are moving towards more terroristic attacks and are being paid simply to create havoc.”
Unfortunately, even paying a ransom is no guarantee a company’s data will be freed because on occasion the perpetrators demand even more money, she says.
“The worst-case scenario, though, occurs when the attacker has so completely destroyed data files and infected hard drives that they are unable to get the data back,” Garbus says. “The cost can run into thousands or even millions of dollars to get the company up and running again.”
So how does a business protect itself against ransomware? Garbus suggests a few precautions.
• Beware of viruses masquerading as virus protection. Do your research and make sure you’re purchasing your virus protection from a reputable brand, Garbus says. Be careful of virus protection software that appears magically and tells you it detected a virus. If you don’t recognize the brand, ignore the findings. That notification may be a virus itself, Garbus says.
• Install firewall protection. Make sure your hardware and software are protected with firewalls and software that scans the environment for worms, harmful attachments and attacks.
• Set up procedures and protocols for data access. It’s important to make sure access to data is limited. For example, the system administrator role should be handed out to a limited number of employees who should not share log-in information with each other. Also, when an employee leaves, make sure their access is taken away and passwords changed.
• Have backups of all important data. If you have your information backed up in an offsite location, then you won’t lose it to cyber kidnappers. “Whether it’s large companies or small businesses, too often people forget to back up their data,” Garbus says.
• Be careful about Google search results. Sometimes a Google search itself makes you vulnerable. You don’t want to download anything unless you know you are on the correct site. Garbus says the criminal hackers now have very sophisticated strategies to get you to click and download their malware and can infect your environment very quickly.
• Figure out what kind of ransomware you’re dealing with. If your system is hijacked, know this; Not all ransomware is equal and you may not need to pay the ransom. One type of ransomware basically locks you out of your applications and processes. It may create a barrier between you and the computer’s interface so you can’t get past the ransomware attack screen. But the good news is this type of ransomware can be cleansed and your files restored without paying the ransom. A second type of ransomware is more insidious. It encrypts and renames your files so yo don’t have any access to them until you give in to the ransom demands.
“Businesses should review their security processes at least once a year,” Garbus says. “You may want to hire an outside source to review security and, if you believe it necessary, even hire a professional hacker to look for holes in your system.”
About Penny Garbus
Penny Garbus, co-founder of Soaring Eagle Consulting Inc. (www.SoaringEagle.guru), is co-author of Mining New Gold – Managing Your Business Data. She has been working in the data-management field since leaving college when she worked as a data entry clerk for Pitney Bowes Credit. She later ran the training and marketing deaprtment of Northern Lights Software.
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Keeping most sexual assault and rape crimes from 911, local police, criminal investigations, District Attorneys and courts is how Gov. Cuomo and Cardinal Dolan are protecting thousands of sexual predators & pedophiles
Most women and young girls with disabilities sexually assaulted & raped in group homes cannot add their names to the #MeToo list, so we must be their voice
Gov. Cuomo & Cardinal Dolan have protected countless sexual predators, pedophiles and rapists allowing them to prey on and rape our most vulnerable”
— Michael Carey- Advocate for 1,000,000 New Yorkers with disabilities
ALBANY, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES, December 8, 2017 /EINPresswire.com/ -- The sex scandal of epic proportion that must come to light and end now involves New York State and the Catholic Church’s collaborative efforts to shuffle or jockey sexual predator and pedophile caregivers from group home to group home. The same wicked pattern of protecting pedophile priests was exposed by the Boston Globe’s, Spotlight investigative reporting team in 2002; their hard work won them a Pulitzer Prize.
Watch this less than 3 minute “Spotlight” movie trailer than please watch the full movie as soon as you can to fully grasp and understand how horrific sex crimes committed against vulnerable people with disabilities also get buried and covered-up. Try to wrap your mind around how many people have to be involved to protect powerful institutions that are more damn concerned about money and protecting themselves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56jw6tasomc
Here is the first Boston Globe Spotlight investigative team exposé that started it all.
Church allowed abuse by priest for years
Aware of Geoghan record, archdiocese still shuttled him from parish to parish
This bombshell exposé started the avalanche of revelation that Catholic Church leaders were knowingly allowing pedophile priests to sexually victimize and rape hundreds of more innocent children. Here is from the very beginning of this incredible news piece that had to come out;
“Since the mid-1990s, more than 130 people have come forward with horrific childhood tales about how former priest John J. Geoghan allegedly fondled or raped them during a three-decade spree through a half-dozen Greater Boston parishes.
Almost always, his victims were grammar school boys. One was just 4 years old.
Then came last July’s disclosure that Cardinal Bernard F. Law knew about Geoghan’s problems in 1984, Law’s first year in Boston, yet approved his transfer to St. Julia’s parish in Weston.”
Just a little later in this same exposé which you must read for yourselves because the truth come out. What was written shines a light on the much bigger problem, which is the worst of the worst offenders, those that protect and shield sexual predators and pedophiles, which allows them to continue to do what they do, which is to commit crimes, rape and destroy lives.
“Now, as Geoghan faces the first of two criminal trials next week, details about his sexual compulsion are likely to be overshadowed by a question that many Catholics find even more troubling: Why did it take a succession of three cardinals and many bishops 34 years to place children out of Geoghan’s reach?”
Here are some of many news stories regarding the massive Catholic Church payouts, in the multiple billions of dollars, to victims of sexual predator and pedophile priests.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/04/sex-abuse-catholic-church_n_5085414.html
Sex Abuse Cost The U.S. Catholic Church Nearly $3 Billion ...
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released their eleventh annual report on the progress of implementing the Charter for the Protection of ...
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-archdiocese/new-yorks-catholic-church-seeks-100-million-loan-to-pay-priest-victims-idUSKBN1685JW
New York's Catholic Church seeks $100 million loan to pay ...
You must understand most of the pedophile priests and church leaders involved in one way or another escaped justice and only some were exposed and publicly shamed. New York State’s mental health care system is no different, the sexual assault, rapes and sodomizing of vulnerable children and adults is astronomical in scope. The purposeful protection of most of these sexual predators, pedophiles and rapist caregivers is the exact same as what the Catholic Church was doing. Governor Cuomo and other top State leaders have made sure 911 is bypassed so local police cannot respond to these horrific and heinous sex crimes.
For over ten years Attorney General Cuomo and then Governor Andrew Cuomo have protected countless sexual predators, pedophiles and rapists within State run and private mental health facilities and group homes from firing and prosecution. This timeline proves years of Governor Andrew Cuomo’s direct involvement.
Governor Andrew Cuomo and Cardinal Timothy Dolan have worked hard together to protect institutional sex abuse and cover-ups of most of these crimes. In attempts to protect their institutions and vast amounts of money, they have negated their responsibilities to the most vulnerable people they are supposed to serve and protect. Both Governor Cuomo and Cardinal Dolan must be removed from their positions of authority as swiftly as possible. Covering-up or aiding and abetting in the cover-ups of literally thousands of sexual assaults and rapes of people with disabilities are far worse crimes. Governor Cuomo and Cardinal Dolan have allowed countless sexual predators, pedophiles and rapists to continue to remain in the mental health care system to be able to severely harm and rape thousands of vulnerable children and adults with disabilities. This evil must be stopped and the two top people protecting this scandalous sex cover-up scheme must be held fully accountable for their involvement.
Governor Cuomo needed Cardinal Dolan on his side from the very beginning so the governor set an entire week aside to honor Cardinal Dolan, to get his favor, yet Cardinal Dolan was already involved in trying to protect and shield massive amount of money from being paid out to sexual assault victims that were preyed on by Catholic priests.
https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-cuomo-announces-timothy-cardinal-dolan-week-new-york-state
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/opinion/cardinal-dolan-and-the-sex-abuse-scandal.html
The Jonathan Carey Foundation’s extensive investigative work has uncovered wide-scale systemic sexual abuse of the disabled in residential care facilities and group homes and the wide-scale cover-ups. Almost all reported sexual assaults and rapes of people with disabilities are directly reported internally to Governor Cuomo’s abuse hotline, not to 911, and they are covered-up. Both Governor Cuomo and Cardinal Timothy Dolan have full knowledge of these criminal activities and have tried to protect the institutions they lead, for years now, from public shame and massive payouts to these vulnerable sexual assault victims.
Here are numerous very important additional news links that paint the clear picture and connect the dots, always remember, follow the money. It is about keeping billions of dollars flowing into both institutions and minimizing the damages and the amounts of money going out to the victims. Powerful people and powerful institutions serving themselves and not the most vulnerable among us that simply need safe care and services and the same equal access to 911 emergency first responders and equal protection of laws.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/nyregion/abused-and-used-series-page.html.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/13/nyregion/13homes.html
Found on the State of Massachusetts website – “Prevalence of Violence”, http://www.mass.gov/dppc/abuse-recognize/prevalence-of-violence.html
Remember these words spoken from a convicted pedophile of Governor Cuomo’s system calling it “a predators dream.”
The pedophile and former New York State employed caregiver that was eventually caught in a federal porn sting, called New York’s system controlled by Governor Andrew Cuomo “a predator’s dream”
Here is the direct quote from this AP News story written by David Klepper;
“New York State is paying $3 million to the family of developmentally disabled boy repeatedly molested by a staffer at a state-run group home who later wrote that lax supervision at the facility made it "a predator's dream."
Most sex crimes, as well as many other crimes and deaths, are easily covered-up internally because they are being directed to be called to Governor Cuomo’s internal abuse hotline, instead of to 911 where they must go. No longer can 911 call systems, local police and local courts be bypassed. 911 call systems must be immediately called by all mandated reporters regarding all sexual assaults and rapes, as well as obviously all other assault crimes, medical emergencies and deaths. Currently, under Governor Cuomo’s directive, almost all sex assault and rapes of people with disabilities which are obviously crimes disappear internally, they are covered-up. This evil and these gross injustices must be stopped and the people involved in the greater crimes and criminal conspiracy to protecting sexual predators, pedophiles and rapists must be held fully accountable.
Please also donate and support this vital Civil Rights Movement. Thank you.
http://jonathancareyfoundation.org/donate/
If you have any tips or knowledge of sexual assaults, deaths or cover-ups please call the Jonathan Carey Foundation sexual abuse & death tip hotline @ (518) 475-7500
Michael Carey
The Jonathan Carey Foundation
(518) 852-9377
email us here
The incredible life and tragic preventable death of Jonathan Carey, who was disabled, had autism, was non-verbal & only 13 when he was killed by his caregivers
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Alisa Ellis of Heber City will also serve as a vice chair for a second year. Ellis represents District 12, which includes parts of Utah, Summit, Wasatch, Duchesne, Daggett, and Uintah counties. She was elected to the State Board in 2016 and in 2017 served as the third vice chair. Ellis said she intends to focus on improving communication and relationships and continuing to work toward restoring local control to district and charter governing boards.
