Jane Edwards
A Kaspersky Lab report says the total number of people who experienced ransomware-related attacks worldwide between April 2015 and March 2016 climbed by 17.7 percent compared to the same period of the previous year.
The company said Wednesday the percentage of users who encountered ransomware more than once reached 4.34 percent in the 2015-2016 period, up from 3.63 percent in 2014-2015.
Kapersky Lab developed the metrics for the report based on the number of users of the company’s platforms that are equipped with the Kaspersky Security Network function.
The study also noted a 25 percent increase in the number of individuals who experienced encryption ransomware-related attacks during the 2015-2016 period due to the emergence of TeslaCrypt, CTB-Locker and other forms of malware that restrict access to files through difficult-to-decode encryption.
According to the report, there was a 13 percent drop in the number of users who came across Windows blockers or attacks that block the operating system with a pop-up window during the 2015-2016 period.
The study also indicated that home users are likely to be targeted by ransomware attacks compared with corporate users.
