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Crypto-Ransomware : Your Worst Information Technology Disaster
Ransomware has become an escalating cyber pandemic that presents an enterprise-level danger for businesses poorly prepared for an attack. Versions of ransomware like the CrySIS, WannaCry, Bad Rabbit, SamSam and MongoLock cryptoworms have been circulating for years and continue to cause damage. The latest variants of ransomware like Ryuk, Maze, Sodinokibi, DopplePaymer, Conti or Nephilim, plus additional as yet unnamed newcomers, not only do encryption of online information but also infect many accessible system backup. Information synched to the cloud can also be encrypted. In a poorly designed data protection solution, this can make automatic restoration useless and basically knocks the network back to square one.

Getting back online programs and data following a ransomware outage becomes a sprint against the clock as the victim fights to contain the damage, remove the ransomware, and restore enterprise-critical activity. Because crypto-ransomware requires time to move laterally, attacks are often sprung at night, when penetrations tend to take longer to discover. This compounds the difficulty of quickly marshalling and organizing a capable response team.

Progent has a range of services for protecting organizations from ransomware attacks. These include user education to help identify and not fall victim to phishing exploits, ProSight Active Security Monitoring for remote monitoring and management, along with setup and configuration of modern security solutions with AI capabilities from SentinelOne to detect and disable new cyber attacks rapidly. Progent also can provide the services of expert ransomware recovery professionals with the skills and commitment to restore a breached environment as soon as possible.

Progent's Ransomware Restoration Help
Soon after a crypto-ransomware attack, paying the ransom in cryptocurrency does not guarantee that cyber criminals will return the keys to unencrypt any of your information. Kaspersky Labs estimated that seventeen percent of ransomware victims never restored their data even after having sent off the ransom, resulting in more losses. The gamble is also costly. Ryuk ransoms are commonly several hundred thousand dollars. For larger enterprises, the ransom can be in the millions. The other path is to setup from scratch the mission-critical elements of your IT environment. Absent the availability of essential system backups, this calls for a broad range of IT skills, professional project management, and the capability to work non-stop until the recovery project is done.

For decades, Progent has offered expert Information Technology services for businesses throughout the U.S. and has earned Microsoft's Gold Partnership certification in the Datacenter and Cloud Productivity competencies. Progent's group of subject matter experts (SMEs) includes professionals who have been awarded top certifications in important technologies including Microsoft, Cisco, VMware, and popular distributions of Linux. Progent's cybersecurity specialists have earned internationally-recognized certifications including CISA, CISSP-ISSAP, ISACA CRISC, SANS GIAC, and CMMC 2.0. (Visit Progent's certifications). Progent in addition has expertise in accounting and ERP applications. This breadth of expertise affords Progent the ability to knowledgably understand critical systems and re-organize the surviving components of your network system following a crypto-ransomware attack and configure them into a functioning system.

Progent's security team has best of breed project management systems to orchestrate the complicated recovery process. Progent knows the importance of acting quickly and in unison with a client's management and Information Technology resources to prioritize tasks and to put critical systems back on-line as fast as possible.

Customer Case Study: A Successful Ransomware Penetration Recovery
A client escalated to Progent after their organization was penetrated by Ryuk ransomware virus. Ryuk is thought to have been launched by North Korean state sponsored cybercriminals, possibly adopting strategies exposed from America's NSA organization. Ryuk targets specific companies with little or no room for disruption and is among the most profitable instances of ransomware. Headline victims include Data Resolution, a California-based data warehousing and cloud computing firm, and the Chicago Tribune. Progent's customer is a regional manufacturer based in the Chicago metro area with around 500 workers. The Ryuk penetration had frozen all business operations and manufacturing capabilities. Most of the client's data backups had been online at the time of the attack and were eventually encrypted. The client was evaluating paying the ransom demand (in excess of two hundred thousand dollars) and praying for the best, but ultimately reached out to Progent.

Progent worked with the client to quickly determine and prioritize the essential areas that needed to be addressed to make it possible to resume company functions:

• Microsoft Active Directory
• Microsoft Exchange Email
• MRP System

Within two days, Progent was able to restore Windows Active Directory to its pre-penetration state. Progent then performed setup and hard drive recovery on mission critical systems. All Microsoft Exchange Server ties and attributes were usable, which accelerated the rebuild of Exchange. Progent was also able to assemble intact OST files (Microsoft Outlook Off-Line Folder Files) on staff desktop computers to recover email messages. A recent offline backup of the client's accounting software made it possible to recover these essential applications back on-line. Although a large amount of work was left to recover completely from the Ryuk event, the most important systems were recovered rapidly:

Throughout the following month key milestones in the restoration project were completed in close cooperation between Progent consultants and the customer:

• Internal web applications were brought back up with no loss of data.
• The MailStore Server with over four million historical messages was brought online and accessible to users.
• CRM/Product Ordering/Invoices/Accounts Payable/Accounts Receivables (AR)/Inventory Control functions were 100% recovered.
• A new Palo Alto Networks 850 security appliance was set up.
• Nearly all of the user desktops were operational.

Conclusion
A possible enterprise-killing disaster was avoided through the efforts of dedicated professionals, a broad array of knowledge, and close teamwork. Although in analyzing the event afterwards the ransomware penetration described here could have been prevented with advanced security technology solutions and ISO/IEC 27001 best practices, user and IT administrator training, and well designed incident response procedures for backup and proper patching controls, the fact remains that state-sponsored hackers from Russia, North Korea and elsewhere are relentless and are an ongoing threat. If you do get hit by a ransomware incursion, remember that Progent's roster of professionals has extensive experience in ransomware virus blocking, removal, and information systems recovery.

To review or download a PDF version of this case study, click:
Progent's Ryuk Virus Recovery Case Study Datasheet. (PDF - 282 KB)

Additional Ransomware Protection Services Available from Progent
Progent can provide companies in Dayton a portfolio of remote monitoring and security assessment services to help you to minimize the threat from ransomware. These services incorporate modern AI technology to uncover zero-day strains of ransomware that are able to get past traditional signature-based security products.

• ProSight Active Security Monitoring: Endpoint Protection and Ransomware Defense
  Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) is an endpoint protection (EPP) service that incorporates SentinelOne's cutting edge behavior machine learning technology to guard physical and virtual endpoints against modern malware attacks such as ransomware and file-less exploits, which easily escape legacy signature-based AV tools. ProSight ASM safeguards on-premises and cloud resources and offers a single platform to address the entire threat lifecycle including blocking, detection, containment, cleanup, and post-attack forensics. Top features include one-click rollback with Windows VSS and real-time network-wide immunization against new attacks. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, reseller, and integrator. Read more about Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring endpoint protection and ransomware recovery.

• ProSight Enhanced Security Protection: Physical and Virtual Endpoint Protection and Microsoft Exchange Filtering
  ProSight Enhanced Security Protection (ESP) managed services deliver economical in-depth protection for physical servers and virtual machines, workstations, mobile devices, and Exchange Server. ProSight ESP uses adaptive security and advanced heuristics for round-the-clock monitoring and responding to cyber assaults from all vectors. ProSight ESP offers firewall protection, intrusion alarms, device management, and web filtering through cutting-edge tools packaged within one agent accessible from a unified control. Progent's security and virtualization experts can assist you to plan and configure a ProSight ESP environment that addresses your company's specific needs and that helps you demonstrate compliance with government and industry information protection standards. Progent will assist you define and configure security policies that ProSight ESP will manage, and Progent will monitor your network and react to alarms that call for urgent action. Progent's consultants can also assist you to set up and verify a backup and disaster recovery system like ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS) so you can recover rapidly from a potentially disastrous security attack such as ransomware. Read more about Progent's ProSight Enhanced Security Protection (ESP) unified physical and virtual endpoint security and Exchange email filtering.

• ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS): Managed Backup and Disaster Recovery Services
  Progent has worked with leading backup/restore technology providers to create ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS), a portfolio of subscription-based management offerings that provide backup-as-a-service. ProSight DPS services automate and monitor your data backup processes and allow non-disruptive backup and rapid restoration of important files, applications, images, and VMs. ProSight DPS helps your business avoid data loss caused by hardware breakdown, natural calamities, fire, malware such as ransomware, user error, ill-intentioned employees, or application glitches. Managed backup services in the ProSight DPS portfolio include ProSight Altaro VM Backup, ProSight 365 Total Backup (formerly Altaro 365 Backup), ProSight ECHO Backup using Barracuda purpose-built hardware, and ProSight DPS MSP360 Hybrid Backup. Your Progent expert can help you to identify which of these fully managed services are best suited for your IT environment.

• ProSight Email Guard: Inbound and Outbound Spam Filtering and Data Leakage Protection
  ProSight Email Guard is Progent's spam filtering service that uses the infrastructure of top data security companies to provide centralized control and world-class security for all your email traffic. The hybrid structure of Email Guard combines a Cloud Protection Layer with a local security gateway appliance to offer advanced defense against spam, viruses, Dos Attacks, Directory Harvest Attacks (DHAs), and other email-borne malware. The cloud filter serves as a preliminary barricade and blocks the vast majority of threats from making it to your security perimeter. This reduces your exposure to external threats and saves network bandwidth and storage space. Email Guard's on-premises gateway device adds a deeper layer of inspection for inbound email. For outgoing email, the on-premises security gateway offers anti-virus and anti-spam protection, protection against data leaks, and email encryption. The on-premises security gateway can also assist Exchange Server to monitor and safeguard internal email that stays within your security perimeter. For more details, see Email Guard spam and content filtering.

• ProSight WAN Watch: Infrastructure Remote Monitoring and Management
  Progent's ProSight WAN Watch is an infrastructure monitoring and management service that makes it simple and inexpensive for small and mid-sized businesses to map, monitor, enhance and debug their networking appliances such as routers, firewalls, and access points plus servers, endpoints and other devices. Using cutting-edge RMM technology, ProSight WAN Watch makes sure that network maps are always current, captures and manages the configuration information of virtually all devices connected to your network, monitors performance, and generates alerts when issues are discovered. By automating time-consuming network management processes, ProSight WAN Watch can knock hours off common chores such as making network diagrams, reconfiguring your network, finding devices that require important software patches, or identifying the cause of performance issues. Learn more details about ProSight WAN Watch network infrastructure monitoring and management services.

• ProSight LAN Watch: Server and Desktop Monitoring
  ProSight LAN Watch is Progent's server and desktop monitoring service that incorporates advanced remote monitoring and management (RMM) technology to keep your network running efficiently by tracking the health of critical assets that power your business network. When ProSight LAN Watch uncovers a problem, an alert is transmitted immediately to your specified IT personnel and your assigned Progent consultant so any looming problems can be addressed before they have a chance to impact productivity. Learn more details about ProSight LAN Watch server and desktop monitoring consulting.

• ProSight Virtual Hosting: Hosted Virtual Machines at Progent's Tier III Data Center
  With Progent's ProSight Virtual Hosting service, a small organization can have its critical servers and applications hosted in a secure Tier III data center on a high-performance virtual machine host configured and managed by Progent's network support professionals. With the ProSight Virtual Hosting service model, the customer retains ownership of the data, the operating system platforms, and the applications. Because the environment is virtualized, it can be ported immediately to an alternate hardware environment without requiring a time-consuming and technically risky configuration procedure. With ProSight Virtual Hosting, your business is not locked into one hosting service. Learn more details about ProSight Virtual Hosting services.

• ProSight IT Asset Management: Network Documentation Management
  Progent's ProSight IT Asset Management service is a cloud-based IT documentation management service that makes it easy to create, maintain, find and protect information about your network infrastructure, processes, applications, and services. You can quickly locate passwords or serial numbers and be warned about upcoming expirations of SSL certificates or domains. By cleaning up and organizing your network documentation, you can save up to half of time spent looking for critical information about your IT network. ProSight IT Asset Management includes a common repository for storing and sharing all documents required for managing your network infrastructure like standard operating procedures and self-service instructions. ProSight IT Asset Management also offers a high level of automation for gathering and relating IT data. Whether you're making enhancements, doing regular maintenance, or reacting to a crisis, ProSight IT Asset Management delivers the knowledge you need as soon as you need it. Read more about Progent's ProSight IT Asset Management service.

• Progent Active Protection Against Ransomware: Machine Learning-based Ransomware Identification and Cleanup
  Progent's Active Protection Against Ransomware is an endpoint protection managed service that utilizes next generation behavior analysis tools to guard endpoints and physical and virtual servers against modern malware assaults like ransomware and file-less exploits, which routinely get by traditional signature-matching anti-virus tools. Progent ASM services safeguard on-premises and cloud-based resources and offers a single platform to automate the complete malware attack lifecycle including blocking, detection, mitigation, cleanup, and post-attack forensics. Key features include single-click rollback using Windows VSS and real-time system-wide immunization against newly discovered threats. Learn more about Progent's ransomware defense and recovery services.

• Outsourced/Co-managed Help Center: Help Desk Managed Services
  Progent's Support Center managed services allow your information technology group to offload Support Desk services to Progent or split activity for Service Desk support seamlessly between your internal support staff and Progent's nationwide pool of certified IT service technicians, engineers and subject matter experts (SMEs). Progent's Shared Help Desk Service provides a smooth extension of your corporate network support staff. End user interaction with the Service Desk, provision of support, issue escalation, trouble ticket creation and updates, performance measurement, and maintenance of the support database are cohesive regardless of whether incidents are resolved by your in-house support staff, by Progent's team, or by a combination. Find out more about Progent's outsourced/shared Service Center services.

• Patch Management: Software/Firmware Update Management Services
  Progent's managed services for software and firmware patch management provide businesses of all sizes a versatile and cost-effective solution for evaluating, validating, scheduling, applying, and tracking software and firmware updates to your ever-evolving information system. In addition to optimizing the protection and functionality of your IT network, Progent's software/firmware update management services permit your IT team to concentrate on line-of-business projects and tasks that derive maximum business value from your information network. Learn more about Progent's software/firmware update management support services.

• ProSight Duo Multi-Factor Authentication: Identity Validation, Endpoint Policy Enforcement, and Protected Single Sign-on (SSO)
  Progent's Duo authentication managed services utilize Cisco's Duo technology to protect against password theft through the use of two-factor authentication (2FA). Duo enables one-tap identity confirmation with iOS, Android, and other out-of-band devices. Using Duo 2FA, when you sign into a secured application and give your password you are requested to confirm your identity via a device that only you possess and that is accessed using a separate network channel. A broad range of devices can be utilized as this second form of ID validation such as an iPhone or Android or watch, a hardware/software token, a landline phone, etc. You may register multiple verification devices. For more information about ProSight Duo identity authentication services, visit Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services.

• ProSight Reporting: Real-time and In-depth Reporting for Ticketing and Network Monitoring Applications
  ProSight Reporting is a growing line of in-depth reporting plug-ins designed to work with the industry's top ticketing and remote network monitoring programs such as ConnectWise Manage, ConnectWise Automate, Customer Thermometer, Auvik, and SentinelOne. ProSight Reporting uses Microsoft Graph and utilizes color coding to highlight and contextualize key issues such as spotty support follow-through or endpoints with out-of-date AVs. By exposing ticketing or network health concerns clearly and in near-real time, ProSight Reporting enhances productivity, lowers management overhead, and saves money. For more information, see ProSight Reporting for ticketing and network monitoring applications.