Featured content

What we know so far The WannaCry ransomware worm outbreak from last Friday week used just one of the leaked NSA exploit tools, ETERNALBLUE, which exploits vulnerabilities in the SMBv1 file sharing protocol.

Quick ransomware background Ransomware is a type of malware that encrypts your data and asks for you to pay a ransom to restore access to your files. Cyber criminals usually request that the ransom be paid in Bitcoins: the #1 cryptocurrency (basically a distributed ledger) which can be used to buy and sell goods. By nature, Bitcoin transactions (e.g. ransom payments) are very difficult to trace.

Ransomware attacks have become a major security threat. It feels like each week a new variant is announced –Ransom32, 7ev3n. This malware may even be involved in the next big breach. New variants such as Chimera threaten to not just ransom your data, but also leak it online if you don’t pay up.

This article is part of the series "SQL Server Best Practices". Check out the rest: Part I: Configuration Part II: Virtualized Environments

This article is part of the series "SQL Server Best Practices". Check out the rest: Part I: Configuration Part II: Virtualized Environments

Ransomware’s Early Days The first documented and purported example of ransomware was the 1989 AIDS Trojan, also known as PS Cyborg1. Harvard-trained evolutionary biologist Joseph L. Popp sent 20,000 infected diskettes labeled “AIDS Information – Introductory Diskettes” to attendees of the World Health Organization’s international AIDS conference.