VaiSulWeb introduces new functionalities for its active protection provided in collaboration with Acronis. After introducing an active protection from ransomware, backup agents now can also protect from cryptominers and cryptojacking.
What cryptominers and cryptojacking is
Contrary to what ransomware malware do, since in that case the goal is to abusively access your machine to encrypt your files and ask for a ransom, cryptojacking goal is to abusively access your machine (desktop or server) to install an hidden cryptominer. Mining a cryptocurrency requires lots of processing power and thus a new form of attack was born to address such needs: hackers can install hidden miners onto your machine to use its processing power for their own purposes and offload such complicated processing onto your machine.
Such attacks usually don’t aim at deleting your data or harming your machine because they want to steal your processing power for their own purposes but that also means that legitimate applications will run much slower because most of the resources of your machine will be used by the miner. Moreover, such malware can also be used as a vehicle to install other malware like ransomware.
For machines that run on public cloud like Microsoft Azure or Amazon AWS where customers will be billed based on resource consumption (for example, CPU time consumed in a given month), hidden cryptominers could make costs spike because they will also consume resources that usually will not be used.
The new Acronis agents use Artificially Intelligence (AI) to detect and block cryptominers in real time. Moreover, they also use heuristic solutions to detect yet unknown miners thanks to the analysis of their behaviour.
Cryptokjacking numbers
Given the increasing popularity of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoins, cryptojacking attacks soared by 629% during the 2018, with 3 million hits detected in the first half of 2018 alone. Chances are that such attacks will keep increasing while the popularity of cryptocurrencies soars and new cryptocurrencies will be introduced.
How to enable protection from cryptomining
Customers that are already using our Acronis agents to backup and protect their Windows systems can simply enable the new protection inside their backup plans, as shown in the following picture :
It’s that easy ! Customers should ensure to run the latest agent version in order to be able to enable cryptominers protection.
Customers that didn’t sign up for VaiSulWeb backup services yet, can read more information about such services by visiting the following URL:
https://www.vaisulweb.com/services/backup-services/
VaiSulWeb is non-stop innovation
Features that VaiSulWeb just introduced confirm company constant push towards innovation. VaiSulWeb customers can enjoy the latest and most innovative technologies as soon as they are available on the market. That also confirms as positive company choice, the one of Acronis as a partner for backup and protection services.
For more information, users can contact our support department.
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