Favorite Hacker Tricks

Security / Ransomware Awareness Tip

Be wary of USB drives that are given out at tradeshows and conferences. They might not be what you are expecting.

Scenario #1: You are at a trade booth and the vendor is offering a free USB drive for listening to the pitch….

You are expecting a USB drive with some files on it with the vendor’s information.

What you didn’t know is that a hacker picked up some of the USB disks that exactly match, or even grabbed a handful of branded ones from the vendor right at the tradeshow and replaced the files with their hacked versions; same file names!

Anyone that clicks on them expecting a trade show vendor document gets rudely surprised with an encryption message asking for a bitcoin to be sent to an address to get the code to unlock the files. Not good, considering at this time bitcoin is over $50,000 USD.

Scenario #2: You are in a breakout room and your find a USB disk on the floor under a desk.

Looks innocent enough. Not!

Same problem as the above scenario. You will be in bad shape innocently clicking on a file on it. Especially the one labelled passwords.xls

Some anti-virus protected systems automatically check for viruses but some do not.

Some USB disks are programmed to execute a run file as soon as you put it in your desktop or laptop, and tries auto-installing remote control software that dials out.

Be wary, especially if your system isn’t protected and updated regularly. You don’t want to be responsible for encrypting the entire Company LAN drives. Some backups are not protected against this and get encrypted so there is no choice but to pay the ransom. Are you aware that even with the ransom paid some encryptions do not even work?

Stay ahead by protecting your systems and practicing safe IT!

NetAccess Systems MSP Team

More information on our NetPro range of services including Security Awareness Training.

Should you need assistance working with your last line of defense, your value staff members and their security training, please let us know if you would like to work with NetAccess, we’d be glad to help. You can also call our main line at 905-524-2001 to speak to someone in sales if you don’t have a managed support engagement with NetAccess.

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