According to the IOCTA 2019 annual report, presented by Europol in October 2019.
Ransomware represents the main cyber threat of 2019 and 2020. Initially widespread in Russia, ransomware attacks have now penetrated worldwide (The McAfee software house estimated that there were almost 250,000 ransomware attacks in 2013 around the world!). But what is a ransomware?

Ransomware are computer viruses that block access to the device that is infected, encrypt data and ask for the payment of a ransom to restore it. The first ransomware in history was PC Cyborg, written in 1989 by biologist Joseph Popp, named after it because it encrypted hard disk files and demanded payment of 189 dollars from the "PC Cyborg Corporation". This ransomware spread very little as few people used computers, the internet was under development and encryption technology was limited. To date, these viruses have made great strides, just take a look at the best known:

• WannaCry, infected over 230,000 computers in 150 countries and demanded a ransom in bitcoin in 28 different languages.
• CryptoLocker, generated 2048-bit RSA key pairs, managed to extort $ 3 million before being removed.
• CryptoLocker.F, spread via email and infected an Australian television broadcast by interrupting the show for half an hour.

To infect a machine they can exploit the advertising banners of the sites or through an attachment of an infected email (which if clicked can search and exploit vulnerabilities present in various programs such as Java, Adobe Flash and Adobe Acrobat).

How to prevent?

•  Never open email attachments from dubious origin.
•  Update operating systems and software.
•  Use accounts without administrator rights.
•  Keep browser plug-ins always up to date.

 Save your data and documents in offline hard disks (disconnected from computer and network).

Thank you for reading and stay tuned.