As the new school opened on Tuesday, in a way we couldn’t have imagined a year ago, the Hartford School District was hit with a ransomware attack. The attack caused Hartford to shut down systems to limit damage.
It wasn’t a particularly unusual instance of ransomware, save perhaps for the
timing. The attacker had access for days before disabling Hartford systems It spread quickly, impacting a number of interconnected services, including 200 out of 300 Public School servers. And, it came with the usual demands for ransom.
What was unusual was Hartford’s response. While the Ransomware caused a shutdown on the first day of school, the School district was up and running a day later. Hartford’s mayor, who refused to engage with the attackers, credits the city’s cybersecurity efforts over the last year with the quick recovery. It turns out Hartford had invested almost $500,000 in Cybersecurity during 2019, which allowed the system restoration in a rapid manner. As security practitioners are sadly aware, it’s a rare occurrence that gives you demonstrable evidence of Security ROI, so hopefully the Hartford team is celebrating a well-earned victory.
But the important takeaway here isn’t that security has to cost half a million dollars. It doesn’t have to. What is important here is that preparation and having the necessary and effective safeguards in place can protect your company when the ransomware attackers come knocking.
If your company doesn’t have a Cybersecurity Strategy, or you have one but are having trouble implementing it, Call us to talk about how we can help.
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