The Ransomware Task Force (RTF), associated with the Institute for Security and Technology, recently published a December 2022 Progress Report, stressing that the scale of the ransomware threat continues to grow, even as stakeholders are devoting more attention to the challenge. 

In a June speech, the head of the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), Lindy Cameron, said, “even with a war raging in Ukraine – the biggest global cyber threat we still face is ransomware.” In fact, a report by researchers at Barracuda Networks corroborated this assertion, noting that the volume of ransomware attacks spiked to 1.2 million per month in 2022. The latest report identifies the ongoing progress of implementing the 48 initial recommendations formulated by the RTF 18 months ago. In terms of preparation, the report notes that governments have increased the sharing of threat information and provided additional funding for cyber defense, among other actions. For response efforts, there has been some progress made. Of note, one of the recommendations in this category encourages organizations to report ransomware incidents. Overall, the report notes that government and industry have made good progress in implementing actions to help mitigate the ransomware threat, but it stresses that more must be done.

Members are encouraged to review the progress report to understand the developments and resources available in the fight against ransomware and for specifics that could potentially have direct impact for victims, such as incident reporting. Read more at IST.