24-7 Broomfield Urgent Crypto
Computer Virus Assessment and Removal Support

Ransomware : Your Feared IT Catastrophe
Ransomware has become a too-frequent cyberplague that presents an enterprise-level danger for businesses of all sizes poorly prepared for an assault. Different versions of ransomware like the CryptoLocker, CryptoWall, Bad Rabbit, Syskey and MongoLock cryptoworms have been out in the wild for a long time and continue to inflict damage. Modern variants of ransomware such as Ryuk, Maze, Sodinokibi, Netwalker, Conti or Nephilim, along with frequent unnamed malware, not only encrypt on-line files but also infect most available system backups. Data replicated to off-site disaster recovery sites can also be encrypted. In a poorly designed environment, this can make automated restoration hopeless and effectively sets the datacenter back to square one.

Getting back on-line services and information after a ransomware outage becomes a sprint against time as the targeted business tries its best to stop the spread, eradicate the virus, and resume enterprise-critical operations. Due to the fact that ransomware needs time to move laterally, penetrations are usually launched at night, when successful attacks are likely to take more time to discover. This multiplies the difficulty of promptly assembling and organizing a capable mitigation team.

Progent has a range of support services for securing enterprises from crypto-ransomware attacks. These include user education to help identify and not fall victim to phishing attempts, ProSight Active Security Monitoring for remote monitoring and management, in addition to setup and configuration of modern security gateways with artificial intelligence capabilities from SentinelOne to identify and quarantine day-zero threats automatically. Progent also provides the assistance of expert ransomware recovery engineers with the talent and commitment to reconstruct a breached network as soon as possible.

Progent's Ransomware Restoration Support Services
Following a crypto-ransomware invasion, sending the ransom demands in cryptocurrency does not ensure that criminal gangs will provide the keys to unencrypt all your data. Kaspersky estimated that 17% of ransomware victims never restored their information even after having paid the ransom, resulting in more losses. The risk is also expensive. Ryuk ransoms are typically a few hundred thousand dollars. For larger enterprises, the ransom can reach millions. The fallback is to re-install the vital parts of your Information Technology environment. Without access to full information backups, this requires a broad range of IT skills, professional project management, and the capability to work 24x7 until the job is over.

For decades, Progent has offered professional Information Technology services for businesses throughout the U.S. and has earned Microsoft's Partnership certification status in the Datacenter and Cloud Productivity competencies. Progent's team of subject matter experts (SMEs) includes consultants who have earned high-level industry certifications in leading technologies like Microsoft, Cisco, VMware, and major distributions of Linux. Progent's cybersecurity experts have earned internationally-recognized certifications including CISM, CISSP, CRISC, SANS GIAC, and CMMC 2.0. (Refer to Progent's certifications). Progent in addition has expertise with accounting and ERP applications. This breadth of experience gives Progent the capability to efficiently identify necessary systems and consolidate the remaining components of your Information Technology system following a crypto-ransomware event and configure them into an operational network.

Progent's recovery team of experts utilizes top notch project management systems to coordinate the complex restoration process. Progent knows the urgency of working rapidly and in concert with a client's management and Information Technology staff to assign priority to tasks and to get critical applications back online as soon as humanly possible.

Customer Story: A Successful Crypto-Ransomware Penetration Recovery
A client contacted Progent after their network system was crashed by Ryuk ransomware. Ryuk is believed to have been created by Northern Korean state criminal gangs, possibly adopting approaches exposed from the U.S. NSA organization. Ryuk seeks specific businesses with limited ability to sustain operational disruption and is one of the most profitable examples of crypto-ransomware. Well Known targets include Data Resolution, a California-based info warehousing and cloud computing company, and the Chicago Tribune. Progent's customer is a regional manufacturing business located in the Chicago metro area with around 500 employees. The Ryuk event had brought down all business operations and manufacturing processes. The majority of the client's system backups had been online at the beginning of the intrusion and were eventually encrypted. The client was pursuing financing for paying the ransom demand (in excess of $200,000) and praying for good luck, but ultimately called Progent.

Progent worked together with the customer to quickly identify and assign priority to the key systems that had to be restored to make it possible to resume departmental functions:

• Active Directory
• Electronic Mail
• Financials/MRP

In less than 48 hours, Progent was able to re-build Windows Active Directory to its pre-virus state. Progent then charged ahead with setup and storage recovery on needed servers. All Exchange data and configuration information were usable, which accelerated the rebuild of Exchange. Progent was also able to locate intact OST files (Microsoft Outlook Off-Line Folder Files) on user workstations in order to recover email data. A not too old offline backup of the client's accounting/MRP systems made it possible to recover these essential services back online for users. Although a lot of work remained to recover completely from the Ryuk attack, the most important systems were recovered quickly:

During the following couple of weeks critical milestones in the recovery process were made in tight cooperation between Progent engineers and the client:

• Self-hosted web sites were returned to operation with no loss of information.
• The MailStore Exchange Server with over 4 million historical emails was brought online and accessible to users.
• CRM/Product Ordering/Invoicing/AP/Accounts Receivables (AR)/Inventory modules were 100% recovered.
• A new Palo Alto 850 firewall was set up and programmed.
• Nearly all of the user workstations were operational.

Conclusion
A possible business catastrophe was avoided due to hard-working professionals, a wide spectrum of IT skills, and close teamwork. Although in post mortem the ransomware virus incident detailed here could have been identified and stopped with current security technology and security best practices, team education, and appropriate security procedures for data protection and keeping systems up to date with security patches, the reality is that state-sponsored cyber criminals from China, Russia, North Korea and elsewhere are relentless and are an ongoing threat. If you do get hit by a ransomware attack, feel confident that Progent's roster of experts has a proven track record in ransomware virus defense, mitigation, and data recovery.

To read or download a PDF version of this customer story, please click:
Progent's Ransomware Virus Recovery Case Study Datasheet. (PDF - 282 KB)

Additional Crypto-Ransomware Protection Services Available from Progent
Progent offers businesses in Broomfield a portfolio of remote monitoring and security assessment services designed to assist you to minimize your vulnerability to ransomware. These services incorporate modern machine learning technology to uncover new variants of crypto-ransomware that are able to evade legacy signature-based security products.

• ProSight Managed Service Packages: for Small to Mid-size Businesses
  Progent's ProSight Managed IT Service Packages make it practical for small and mid-size companies to utilize Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) technology to achieve leading-edge IT resilience. Progent handles the daily monitoring and maintenance for you, so your system expands readily without becoming an obstacle. For a low and predictable monthly subscription, Progent's full-service IT group can be your complete technology safety net. Entry-level packages include remote monitoring and management, security, automatic monthly patching, and documentation. As your needs expand, you can add low-cost subscriptions to advanced solutions such as SaaS M365/Google Workspace backup and restore, Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), penetration testing, or WiFi management.

• ProSight LAN Watch: Server and Desktop Monitoring and Management
  ProSight LAN Watch is Progent's server and desktop remote monitoring service that uses state-of-the-art remote monitoring and management technology to keep your network running efficiently by tracking the health of critical assets that drive your information system. When ProSight LAN Watch uncovers a problem, an alert is transmitted immediately to your specified IT management staff and your assigned Progent engineering consultant so all potential issues can be resolved before they have a chance to impact productivity. Learn more details about ProSight LAN Watch server and desktop monitoring services.

• ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM: Unified RMM for Networks, Servers, and Workstations
  ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM software delivers a unified, cloud-based platform for monitoring and managing your client-server infrastructure by providing tools for performing common tedious tasks. These can include health monitoring, update management, automated remediation, endpoint setup, backup and recovery, anti-virus protection, remote access, standard and custom scripts, asset inventory, endpoint profile reports, and debugging help. If ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM identifies a serious incident, it transmits an alert to your designated IT staff and your Progent technical consultant so potential problems can be fixed before they interfere with your network. Learn more about ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM server and desktop monitoring services.

• ProSight WAN Watch: Infrastructure Remote Monitoring and Management
  Progent's ProSight WAN Watch is a network infrastructure monitoring and management service that makes it simple and affordable for small and mid-sized businesses to diagram, track, enhance and troubleshoot their networking appliances like routers and switches, firewalls, and access points plus servers, printers, client computers and other networked devices. Incorporating cutting-edge Remote Monitoring and Management technology, WAN Watch ensures that network maps are kept current, captures and manages the configuration of virtually all devices on your network, monitors performance, and sends notices when problems are discovered. By automating time-consuming network management activities, WAN Watch can knock hours off ordinary chores like making network diagrams, expanding your network, locating appliances that need critical software patches, or isolating performance issues. Find out more details about ProSight WAN Watch infrastructure management services.

• ProSight Reporting: Real-time Reporting for Ticketing and Network Monitoring Applications
  ProSight Reporting is an expanding line of real-time reporting plug-ins designed to work with the industry's leading ticketing and remote network monitoring platforms including ConnectWise Manage, ConnectWise Automate, Customer Thermometer, Auvik, and SentinelOne. ProSight Reporting incorporates Microsoft Graph and features color coding to highlight and contextualize key issues such as spotty support follow-up or endpoints with out-of-date AVs. By exposing ticketing or network health concerns concisely and in near-real time, ProSight Reporting improves productivity, reduces management hassle, and saves money. For more information, see ProSight Reporting for ticketing and network monitoring applications.

• ProSight Data Protection Services: Backup and Recovery Services
  Progent has partnered with advanced backup/restore software companies to create ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS), a portfolio of subscription-based management outsourcing plans that provide backup-as-a-service. ProSight DPS services automate and track your data backup operations and allow transparent backup and fast recovery of important files/folders, applications, system images, and VMs. ProSight DPS lets your business avoid data loss resulting from equipment breakdown, natural disasters, fire, cyber attacks such as ransomware, human mistakes, ill-intentioned employees, or application glitches. Managed services available in the ProSight Data Protection Services product line include ProSight Altaro VM Backup, ProSight 365 Total Backup (formerly Altaro 365 Backup), ProSight ECHO Backup based on Barracuda purpose-built storage, and ProSight MSP360 Cloud and On-prem Backup. Your Progent service representative can assist you to determine which of these fully managed backup services are best suited for your network.

• ProSight Email Guard: Inbound and Outbound Spam Filtering and Data Leakage Protection
  ProSight Email Guard is Progent's spam and virus filtering and email encryption service that incorporates the technology of top information security companies to deliver web-based control and world-class security for your email traffic. The powerful architecture of Email Guard managed service integrates cloud-based filtering with an on-premises security gateway device to offer advanced protection against spam, viruses, Denial of Service Attacks, Directory Harvest Attacks (DHAs), and other email-borne threats. Email Guard's cloud filter serves as a preliminary barricade and blocks the vast majority of unwanted email from making it to your security perimeter. This decreases your vulnerability to external attacks and saves network bandwidth and storage space. Email Guard's on-premises gateway appliance adds a further level of analysis for inbound email. For outgoing email, the onsite gateway offers anti-virus and anti-spam protection, DLP, and email encryption. The local gateway can also help Exchange Server to track and protect internal email that stays inside your corporate firewall. For more information, see ProSight Email Guard spam filtering and data leakage protection.

• ProSight Duo Two-Factor Authentication: Identity Validation, Endpoint Remediation, and Secure Single Sign-on
  Progent's Duo MFA service plans utilize Cisco's Duo technology to protect against stolen passwords by using two-factor authentication (2FA). Duo enables one-tap identity verification on Apple iOS, Android, and other personal devices. Using Duo 2FA, when you sign into a protected application and enter your password you are asked to verify your identity via a device that only you possess and that uses a separate network channel. A wide selection of out-of-band devices can be used as this second form of authentication including an iPhone or Android or wearable, a hardware token, a landline telephone, etc. You can designate several validation devices. To learn more about Duo two-factor identity validation services, refer to Cisco Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services.

• Progent's Outsourced/Shared Help Desk: Call Center Managed Services
  Progent's Help Center services allow your information technology group to offload Support Desk services to Progent or divide activity for support services seamlessly between your internal support resources and Progent's extensive roster of certified IT support technicians, engineers and subject matter experts (SMEs). Progent's Shared Help Desk Service provides a smooth supplement to your in-house network support resources. End user access to the Help Desk, provision of support, issue escalation, trouble ticket creation and tracking, performance metrics, and management of the service database are consistent regardless of whether issues are resolved by your corporate network support group, by Progent's team, or both. Learn more about Progent's outsourced/shared Call Center services.

• Active Defense Against Ransomware: AI-based Ransomware Detection and Remediation
  Progent's Active Protection Against Ransomware is an endpoint protection managed service that incorporates next generation behavior-based machine learning tools to guard endpoints as well as physical and virtual servers against modern malware attacks like ransomware and file-less exploits, which routinely evade legacy signature-based anti-virus products. Progent Active Security Monitoring services safeguard on-premises and cloud resources and provides a single platform to automate the entire malware attack progression including filtering, infiltration detection, containment, remediation, and forensics. Top features include one-click rollback with Windows VSS and real-time system-wide immunization against new threats. Learn more about Progent's ransomware defense and recovery services.

• ProSight IT Asset Management: Network Documentation Management
  ProSight IT Asset Management service is an IT infrastructure documentation management service that allows you to capture, update, retrieve and safeguard information about your network infrastructure, procedures, business apps, and services. You can quickly locate passwords or serial numbers and be alerted automatically about upcoming expirations of SSL certificates ,domains or warranties. By cleaning up and managing your network documentation, you can eliminate as much as 50% of time wasted looking for critical information about your IT network. ProSight IT Asset Management includes a centralized repository for storing and collaborating on all documents required for managing your business network like recommended procedures and self-service instructions. ProSight IT Asset Management also supports advanced automation for gathering and associating IT information. Whether you're making enhancements, doing regular maintenance, or responding to an emergency, ProSight IT Asset Management delivers the data you require as soon as you need it. Find out more about Progent's ProSight IT Asset Management service.

• Progent's Patch Management: Patch Management Services
  Progent's support services for software and firmware patch management provide organizations of all sizes a flexible and affordable alternative for evaluating, validating, scheduling, applying, and tracking updates to your ever-evolving information system. In addition to maximizing the protection and functionality of your IT network, Progent's software/firmware update management services permit your in-house IT team to focus on more strategic initiatives and activities that derive the highest business value from your network. Learn more about Progent's software/firmware update management support services.

• ProSight Virtual Hosting: Hosted Virtual Machines at Progent's World-class Data Center
  With Progent's ProSight Virtual Hosting service, a small business can have its key servers and applications hosted in a protected fault tolerant data center on a fast virtual host configured and managed by Progent's network support experts. With the ProSight Virtual Hosting model, the customer retains ownership of the data, the OS platforms, and the applications. Since the environment is virtualized, it can be ported immediately to an alternate hardware solution without a time-consuming and difficult configuration procedure. With ProSight Virtual Hosting, you are not tied one hosting provider. Learn more about ProSight Virtual Hosting services.

• ProSight Active Security Monitoring: Endpoint Protection and Ransomware Defense
  ProSight Active Security Monitoring is an endpoint protection solution that incorporates SentinelOne's next generation behavior machine learning technology to defend physical and virtual endpoints against new malware attacks such as ransomware and email phishing, which easily evade legacy signature-matching anti-virus products. ProSight ASM safeguards on-premises and cloud resources and provides a unified platform to automate the complete threat lifecycle including protection, identification, mitigation, remediation, and post-attack forensics. Key features include one-click rollback with Windows Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) and automatic system-wide immunization against new attacks. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, reseller, and integrator. Find out more about Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) endpoint protection and ransomware recovery.

• ProSight Enhanced Security Protection: Endpoint Protection and Microsoft Exchange Email Filtering
  Progent's ProSight Enhanced Security Protection (ESP) managed services offer economical in-depth protection for physical and virtual servers, workstations, mobile devices, and Exchange email. ProSight ESP utilizes adaptive security and advanced machine learning for round-the-clock monitoring and responding to security assaults from all vectors. ProSight ESP delivers firewall protection, penetration alerts, endpoint management, and web filtering through leading-edge tools incorporated within one agent accessible from a single control. Progent's data protection and virtualization consultants can assist your business to design and configure a ProSight ESP deployment that addresses your organization's unique needs and that allows you achieve and demonstrate compliance with legal and industry information protection standards. Progent will assist you define and configure security policies that ProSight ESP will manage, and Progent will monitor your IT environment and respond to alarms that require urgent action. Progent's consultants can also help your company to install and test a backup and disaster recovery solution such as ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS) so you can recover rapidly from a potentially disastrous security attack like ransomware. Find out more about Progent's ProSight Enhanced Security Protection unified endpoint protection and Microsoft Exchange email filtering.