24-Hour Denver Immediate Crypto-Ransomware
Virus Damage Assessment and Remediation Support

Ransomware : Your Worst IT Catastrophe
Crypto-Ransomware has become an escalating cyberplague that presents an enterprise-level danger for businesses of all sizes unprepared for an attack. Different iterations of crypto-ransomware like the CryptoLocker, Fusob, Locky, NotPetya and MongoLock cryptoworms have been circulating for years and still cause harm. The latest versions of crypto-ransomware like Ryuk, Maze, Sodinokibi, Netwalker, LockBit or Egregor, along with more as yet unnamed newcomers, not only do encryption of online files but also infect most available system backup. Information replicated to off-site disaster recovery sites can also be corrupted. In a poorly designed environment, it can make automated restoration hopeless and basically sets the entire system back to zero.

Restoring programs and data after a crypto-ransomware attack becomes a sprint against the clock as the victim tries its best to stop the spread, eradicate the ransomware, and resume enterprise-critical operations. Due to the fact that ransomware needs time to spread, assaults are frequently launched during nights and weekends, when successful attacks may take longer to discover. This compounds the difficulty of quickly marshalling and coordinating a qualified response team.

Progent makes available an assortment of help services for securing organizations from ransomware attacks. These include team education to help identify and avoid phishing exploits, ProSight Active Security Monitoring for remote monitoring and management, along with installation of next-generation security appliances with AI capabilities from SentinelOne to discover and extinguish day-zero threats intelligently. Progent in addition offers the assistance of veteran ransomware recovery consultants with the track record and commitment to re-deploy a breached system as soon as possible.

Progent's Ransomware Recovery Help
Soon after a ransomware event, sending the ransom in cryptocurrency does not provide any assurance that criminal gangs will provide the keys to decipher any of your files. Kaspersky Labs estimated that 17% of ransomware victims never recovered their data even after having paid the ransom, resulting in increased losses. The gamble is also costly. Ryuk ransoms are often several hundred thousand dollars. For larger organizations, the ransom can reach millions. The alternative is to setup from scratch the critical elements of your Information Technology environment. Without the availability of complete system backups, this calls for a wide range of skill sets, well-coordinated team management, and the capability to work non-stop until the task is finished.

For twenty years, Progent has made available certified expert IT services for businesses across the US and has achieved Microsoft's Partnership certification status in the Datacenter and Cloud Productivity competencies. Progent's team of subject matter experts (SMEs) includes engineers who have been awarded high-level industry certifications in leading technologies like Microsoft, Cisco, VMware, and popular distributions of Linux. Progent's cybersecurity consultants have earned internationally-recognized certifications including CISM, CISSP-ISSAP, ISACA CRISC, SANS GIAC, and CMMC 2.0. (See Progent's certifications). Progent also has experience in financial systems and ERP application software. This breadth of experience gives Progent the skills to quickly determine critical systems and organize the surviving pieces of your IT environment following a ransomware penetration and configure them into a functioning network.

Progent's ransomware team of experts uses state-of-the-art project management systems to orchestrate the sophisticated restoration process. Progent understands the urgency of acting swiftly and in concert with a customer's management and IT resources to prioritize tasks and to get critical applications back online as fast as humanly possible.

Case Study: A Successful Ransomware Incident Recovery
A customer escalated to Progent after their network was crashed by the Ryuk ransomware. Ryuk is believed to have been created by Northern Korean state cybercriminals, suspected of using techniques leaked from America's NSA organization. Ryuk goes after specific organizations with limited tolerance for operational disruption and is among the most profitable examples of ransomware viruses. Major victims include Data Resolution, a California-based data warehousing and cloud computing business, and the Chicago Tribune. Progent's customer is a small manufacturing business located in Chicago with around 500 workers. The Ryuk intrusion had paralyzed all company operations and manufacturing processes. Most of the client's backups had been on-line at the time of the intrusion and were eventually encrypted. The client was actively seeking loans for paying the ransom demand (more than $200K) and praying for the best, but ultimately utilized Progent.

Progent worked with the customer to rapidly identify and assign priority to the mission critical applications that needed to be restored in order to continue company functions:

• Active Directory (AD)
• Microsoft Exchange
• Financials/MRP

In less than two days, Progent was able to rebuild Windows Active Directory to its pre-virus state. Progent then completed setup and hard drive recovery on the most important servers. All Exchange data and attributes were usable, which facilitated the rebuild of Exchange. Progent was able to collect local OST data files (Outlook Off-Line Data Files) on team desktop computers and laptops to recover email data. A not too old off-line backup of the client's accounting software made it possible to recover these essential services back on-line. Although major work remained to recover fully from the Ryuk event, critical services were returned to operations quickly:

During the next few weeks key milestones in the recovery process were achieved in close cooperation between Progent team members and the customer:

• In-house web applications were brought back up with no loss of information.
• The MailStore Microsoft Exchange Server exceeding four million archived messages was restored to operations and available for users.
• CRM/Customer Orders/Invoicing/Accounts Payable (AP)/Accounts Receivables/Inventory Control modules were completely functional.
• A new Palo Alto Networks 850 firewall was brought on-line.
• Ninety percent of the user desktops were operational.

Conclusion
A likely business catastrophe was averted with results-oriented professionals, a broad array of subject matter expertise, and close teamwork. Although in post mortem the ransomware penetration detailed here should have been identified and disabled with up-to-date security technology solutions and security best practices, user education, and well designed security procedures for information backup and keeping systems up to date with security patches, the fact remains that government-sponsored hackers from China, North Korea and elsewhere are tireless and are an ongoing threat. If you do get hit by a ransomware virus, feel confident that Progent's team of professionals has a proven track record in crypto-ransomware virus defense, remediation, and data recovery.

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

Additional Ransomware Protection Services Available from Progent
Progent offers businesses in Denver a variety of remote monitoring and security assessment services designed to help you to minimize your vulnerability to ransomware. These services include modern machine learning technology to uncover zero-day strains of ransomware that are able to escape detection by legacy signature-based security solutions.

• ProSight Managed Service Packages: for Small to Mid-size Businesses
  Progent's ProSight Managed IT Service Plans make it possible for small and mid-size businesses to utilize Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) solutions to achieve leading-edge network resilience. Progent takes care of the necessary monitoring and maintenance for you, so your network expands easily without holding you back. For an affordable and predictable monthly price, Progent's full-service IT team can be your dependable technology safety net. Entry-level packages include remote monitoring and management (RMM), security, monthly patching, and documentation. As your needs grow, you can add low-cost subscriptions to best-in-class options such as SaaS M365/Google Workspace backup and restore, Multi-Factor Authentication, penetration testing, or WiFi management.

• ProSight LAN Watch: Server and Desktop Monitoring and Management
  ProSight LAN Watch is Progent's server and desktop monitoring service that uses advanced remote monitoring and management (RMM) techniques to help keep your network operating at peak levels by checking the health of critical computers that power your information system. When ProSight LAN Watch detects an issue, an alarm is transmitted immediately to your designated IT management staff and your Progent engineering consultant so any potential issues can be addressed before they have a chance to impact productivity. Find out more about ProSight LAN Watch server and desktop remote monitoring services.

• ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM: Centralized RMM Solution for Networks, Servers, and Workstations
  ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM software delivers a centralized, cloud-driven solution for monitoring and managing your network, server, and desktop devices by offering an environment for streamlining common time-consuming jobs. These can include health checking, update management, automated remediation, endpoint configuration, backup and restore, A/V response, secure remote access, standard and custom scripts, asset inventory, endpoint status reports, and troubleshooting support. If ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM uncovers a serious incident, it transmits an alarm to your designated IT staff and your assigned Progent consultant so potential issues can be fixed before they impact productivity. Find out more about ProSight LAN Watch with NinjaOne RMM server and desktop monitoring consulting.

• ProSight WAN Watch: Infrastructure Remote Monitoring and Management
  ProSight WAN Watch is a network infrastructure monitoring and management service that makes it simple and inexpensive for smaller organizations to diagram, track, optimize and troubleshoot their networking hardware like routers and switches, firewalls, and wireless controllers plus servers, client computers and other networked devices. Using cutting-edge Remote Monitoring and Management technology, WAN Watch makes sure that network diagrams are kept updated, captures and displays the configuration information of almost all devices connected to your network, monitors performance, and sends notices when problems are discovered. By automating tedious network management processes, WAN Watch can cut hours off ordinary chores such as network mapping, reconfiguring your network, locating appliances that require important updates, or identifying the cause of performance issues. Find out more details about ProSight WAN Watch network infrastructure management services.

• ProSight Reporting: In-depth Reporting for Ticketing and Network Monitoring Applications
  ProSight Reporting is an expanding family of real-time management reporting utilities created to work with the industry's top ticketing and network monitoring applications such as ConnectWise Manage, ConnectWise Automate, Customer Thermometer, Auvik, and SentinelOne. ProSight Reporting uses Microsoft Graph and features color coding to highlight and contextualize critical issues such as inconsistent support follow-through or machines with out-of-date AVs. By identifying ticketing or network health concerns concisely and in near-real time, ProSight Reporting enhances network value, reduces management hassle, and saves money. For details, see ProSight Reporting for ticketing and network monitoring applications.

• ProSight Data Protection Services: Backup and Recovery Services
  Progent has partnered with advanced backup technology providers to create ProSight Data Protection Services, a family of subscription-based offerings that deliver backup-as-a-service. ProSight DPS services automate and monitor your data backup processes and enable non-disruptive backup and rapid recovery of critical files/folders, applications, images, plus VMs. ProSight DPS lets your business avoid data loss caused by equipment breakdown, natural disasters, fire, cyber attacks like ransomware, human mistakes, ill-intentioned employees, or application bugs. Managed services in the ProSight Data Protection Services portfolio include ProSight DPS Altaro VM Backup, ProSight 365 Total Backup (formerly Altaro 365 Backup), ProSight ECHO Backup using Barracuda dedicated storage, and ProSight MSP360 Hybrid Backup. Your Progent expert can assist you to identify which of these fully managed backup services are best suited for your IT environment.

• ProSight Email Guard: Inbound and Outbound Spam Filtering and Data Leakage Protection
  ProSight Email Guard is Progent's spam filtering and email encryption service that incorporates the technology of leading information security companies to provide web-based control and world-class security for all your email traffic. The hybrid architecture of Email Guard integrates cloud-based filtering with a local gateway device to offer advanced defense against spam, viruses, Denial of Service (DoS) Attacks, Directory Harvest Attacks, and other email-based threats. Email Guard's cloud filter acts as a preliminary barricade and blocks most unwanted email from making it to your network firewall. This decreases your vulnerability to inbound attacks and conserves network bandwidth and storage. Email Guard's on-premises security gateway appliance provides a further level of inspection for incoming email. For outbound email, the onsite gateway provides AV and anti-spam protection, protection against data leaks, and email encryption. The local gateway can also help Exchange Server to monitor and protect internal email that stays inside your corporate firewall. For more details, visit ProSight Email Guard spam filtering and data leakage protection.

• ProSight Duo Two-Factor Authentication: Identity Validation, Endpoint Remediation, and Protected Single Sign-on (SSO)
  Progent's Duo authentication managed services incorporate Cisco's Duo cloud technology to protect against stolen passwords by using two-factor authentication. Duo supports single-tap identity confirmation on iOS, Google Android, and other personal devices. Using Duo 2FA, whenever you sign into a protected application and give your password you are asked to confirm who you are via a unit that only you have and that uses a different ("out-of-band") network channel. A wide selection of devices can be used as this added form of ID validation such as a smartphone or wearable, a hardware token, a landline phone, etc. You can designate several validation devices. To find out more about Duo identity authentication services, refer to Duo MFA two-factor authentication services.

• Outsourced/Co-managed Help Desk: Support Desk Managed Services
  Progent's Help Center services permit your IT team to outsource Help Desk services to Progent or split responsibilities for Help Desk services seamlessly between your in-house support staff and Progent's nationwide pool of certified IT support technicians, engineers and subject matter experts (SMEs). Progent's Co-managed Help Desk Service offers a smooth supplement to your internal network support staff. End user interaction with the Help Desk, provision of support, issue escalation, trouble ticket creation and tracking, efficiency measurement, and management of the support database are cohesive regardless of whether issues are resolved by your in-house IT support organization, by Progent's team, or a mix of the two. Find out more about Progent's outsourced/co-managed Service Center services.

• Active Protection Against Ransomware: AI-based Ransomware Detection and Remediation
  Progent's Active Defense Against Ransomware is an endpoint protection (EPP) service that incorporates next generation behavior-based analysis technology to defend endpoint devices as well as servers and VMs against new malware attacks such as ransomware and email phishing, which routinely get by traditional signature-based AV products. Progent Active Security Monitoring services protect on-premises and cloud resources and offers a unified platform to automate the complete threat progression including blocking, detection, containment, cleanup, and forensics. Key features include single-click rollback using Windows Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) and automatic system-wide immunization against new attacks. Read more about Progent's ransomware protection and recovery services.

• ProSight IT Asset Management: Network Documentation Management
  Progent's ProSight IT Asset Management service is an IT infrastructure documentation management service that allows you to capture, update, retrieve and protect data related to your IT infrastructure, processes, business apps, and services. You can quickly locate passwords or IP addresses and be warned about impending expirations of SSL certificates or warranties. By cleaning up and organizing your IT infrastructure documentation, you can eliminate as much as 50% of time spent searching for critical information about your IT network. ProSight IT Asset Management features a common location for storing and collaborating on all documents related to managing your business network such as standard operating procedures (SOPs) and How-To's. ProSight IT Asset Management also supports a high level of automation for collecting and relating IT information. Whether you're making enhancements, performing maintenance, or responding to a crisis, ProSight IT Asset Management gets you the knowledge you require when you need it. Find out more about ProSight IT Asset Management service.

• Progent's Patch Management: Software/Firmware Update Management Services
  Progent's managed services for software and firmware patch management offer organizations of all sizes a versatile and affordable solution for assessing, validating, scheduling, implementing, and documenting software and firmware updates to your ever-evolving IT network. In addition to maximizing the security and reliability of your IT environment, Progent's patch management services allow your IT team to concentrate on more strategic projects and tasks that deliver maximum business value from your network. Find out more about Progent's software/firmware update management support services.

• ProSight Virtual Hosting: Hosted VMs at Progent's World-class Data Center
  With Progent's ProSight Virtual Hosting service, a small or mid-size business can have its key servers and apps hosted in a secure Tier III data center on a high-performance virtual host set up and managed by Progent's IT support professionals. With the ProSight Virtual Hosting model, the client owns the data, the operating system software, and the apps. Since the system is virtualized, it can be moved easily to a different hardware solution without requiring a time-consuming and difficult configuration process. With ProSight Virtual Hosting, your business is not locked into one hosting service. Learn more details about ProSight Virtual Hosting services.

• ProSight Active Security Monitoring: Endpoint Protection and Ransomware Defense
  Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring is an endpoint protection solution that utilizes SentinelOne's cutting edge behavior-based machine learning technology to defend physical and virtual endpoint devices against new malware attacks like ransomware and file-less exploits, which routinely get by traditional signature-based AV tools. ProSight ASM protects local and cloud resources and provides a unified platform to address the complete threat progression including filtering, detection, mitigation, remediation, and post-attack forensics. Top capabilities include one-click rollback with Windows Volume Shadow Copy Service 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 defense.

• ProSight Enhanced Security Protection (ESP): Physical and Virtual Endpoint Protection and Microsoft Exchange Email Filtering
  Progent's ProSight Enhanced Security Protection services deliver affordable in-depth protection for physical servers and virtual machines, desktops, smartphones, and Exchange Server. ProSight ESP uses adaptive security and advanced machine learning for round-the-clock monitoring and responding to security assaults from all vectors. ProSight ESP provides firewall protection, penetration alerts, device control, and web filtering via cutting-edge technologies incorporated within one agent accessible from a unified control. Progent's security and virtualization consultants can help you to design and configure a ProSight ESP deployment that meets your organization's unique requirements and that helps you achieve and demonstrate compliance with legal and industry data security regulations. Progent will assist you define and configure policies that ProSight ESP will enforce, and Progent will monitor your IT environment and react to alerts that call for urgent attention. Progent can also help you to install and test a backup and restore solution like ProSight Data Protection Services so you can get back in business rapidly from a potentially disastrous security attack like ransomware. Learn more about Progent's ProSight Enhanced Security Protection (ESP) unified physical and virtual endpoint security and Exchange filtering.