Ransomware Recovery

We work out what you are dealing with before anyone changes anything. Which strain, how far it spread, whether data was stolen as well as encrypted, and whether the attacker is still active on the network. We preserve volatile evidence and take forensic images where they matter. This picture drives every decision that follows, and getting it right early saves days.

Next we stop the spread and cut the attacker off. That usually means isolating affected machines from the network, disabling compromised accounts, blocking the command-and-control the malware calls home to, and protecting anything not yet hit. Containment buys you the calm to recover properly instead of fighting an active intruder while you restore.

Now we remove the attacker’s presence completely: the ransomware binaries, the scheduled tasks and services they planted, the extra accounts they created, and any remote-access tooling. This is the step most self-led recoveries miss. If a single backdoor survives, the encryption comes back, and the second event is usually worse than the first.

With the environment clean, we bring systems back. Where a legitimate decryptor exists for the strain, we assess and use it. Where you have sound backups, we restore from a verified clean recovery point, prioritising the systems your business needs first. We validate data as it returns rather than trusting a green tick. Recovery here is deliberate execution, because the groundwork was done in the earlier phases.

Finally we close the specific hole the attackers used and shore up the obvious neighbours. Multi-factor authentication on remote access, patched edge devices, tighter segmentation, and backups moved out of the attacker’s reach. The goal is that the same crew, using the same method, gets nowhere if they come back.

Remote Desktop open to the internet, protected by a weak or reused password, remains one of the most common ways in. Attackers scan for it constantly and brute-force or buy the credentials. A VPN or edge device left unpatched against a known vulnerability is the same story with a different door.

A single employee entering their password into a convincing fake, or a laptop already carrying an information-stealer, gives an attacker a legitimate login. From there they move laterally, escalate privileges, and reach the systems that matter. The ransomware is often the last act of an intrusion that started weeks earlier.

Part of the forensic work is understanding how the attackers found and, in many cases, destroyed your backups before detonating. When a backup server sits on the domain with shared admin rights, it is an easy target. That finding shapes both the recovery and the hardening that follows.

Building the timeline

We reconstruct what happened using event logs, endpoint telemetry, and file timestamps: when they entered, what they touched, when they deployed the encryptor, and whether they moved data out. That timeline tells you the true scope, and it is what your insurer, your regulator and your board will ask for.

The No More Ransom project and various vendors publish free decryptors for strains whose encryption was broken or whose keys leaked. We identify your strain, using resources like ID Ransomware and the note and file markers, and check whether a legitimate tool applies. When one does, it can save enormous time. We never run an unverified “decryptor” from a dubious source, because plenty of those are simply more malware.

More often, recovery means restoring from backups that predate the attacker’s foothold. The catch is finding a recovery point that is genuinely clean, since attackers frequently sit in a network for weeks before striking, and older backups may already carry their access. We use the incident timeline to pick a safe point, and we rebuild rather than trusting anything the attacker could have touched. Volume Shadow Copies are usually deleted by the ransomware, so we do not rely on them.

People ask for an average ransomware recovery cost, and the honest answer is that it depends entirely on scope: a single server is a different job from a domain-wide event. We do not quote ransom figures or push you toward payment. Our pricing covers the recovery work, is fixed after a scoping call, and is set out plainly below.

Under Article 33 of the GDPR, if the incident is likely to result in a risk to people’s rights, you must notify your supervisory authority within 72 hours of becoming aware of it. Encryption of personal data alone can count, because loss of availability is a breach. If data was exfiltrated, the case for notification is stronger still.

Many groups run leak sites and publish stolen data from victims who refuse to pay. If your data has been taken, you are weighing legal exposure and reputational harm, not just downtime. Establishing whether exfiltration happened, and what left, is a core part of our forensic work, because it changes what you must report.

Where the breach is likely to result in a high risk to individuals, Article 34 requires you to inform them too, without undue delay. We help you understand the scope so your legal counsel and data protection officer can make those calls on solid facts rather than a panicked guess.