How does ransomware get into major networks, such as schools or other large public agencies?
How does ransomware get into major networks, such as schools or other large public agencies?
I read an article about ransomware affecting the public transportation service in Kansas, and I wanted to ask how this can happen. Wikipedia says these are "are typically carried out using a Trojan, entering a system through, for example, a malicious attachment, embedded link in a phishing email, or a vulnerability in a network service," but how? Wouldn't someone still have to deliberately click a malicious link to install it? Wouldn't anyone working for such an agency be educated enough about these threats not to do so?
I wanted to ask in that community, but I was afraid this is such a basic question that I felt foolish posting it there. Does anyone know the exact process by which this typically can happen? I've seen how scammers can do this to individuals with low tech literacy by watching Kitboga, but what about these big agencies?
Edit: After reading some of the responses, it's made me realize why IT often wants to heavily restrict what you can do on a work PC, which is frustrating from an end user perspective, but if people are just clicking links in emails and not following basic internet safety, then damn.
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It's a different kind of scam from the ones you see on kitboga. Those are generally confidence scams meant to leverage tech illiteracy. Ransomware attacks are more like stepping on a landmine. They are these nasty payloads that are just out there on the internet, usually with some kind of passive social engineering like a website that mimics a familiar site and/or phishing emails to get that payload into the network.
So just clicking the link unleashes the beast, so to speak? It would install itself without any further action from the user?
Generally you have to download and run an executable file. So they will try to make it look like the installer for some software you might need.
Also, infected office documents - spreadsheets being the most common. Get the user to download it, open it, and enable macros and you're in. Microsoft has kinda done what they can to prevent end user idiocy, but you can't stop a determined moron.
I mean they could end VBA support and disable makros alltogether. Problem is that many companies have a bunch of excel sheets, with poorly crafted VBA code from 20 years ago, that runs crucial company functions. So they probably have to announce it ten years before and make very big, very loud, very strong marketing, so all the execs in the world realise that yes they need to migrate to dedicated software instead.
Hey mom, look! I’m in this post!