Ransomware Protection Starts with Zero
Stop threats and reduce business risk for today’s hybrid workforce with a proactive, intelligent, and radically simple security architecture.
RANSOMWARE NEWS ALERT:
How to Protect Your Data from Ransomware and Double-ExtortionZero Trust Powers the World’s Most Effective Ransomware Protection
Protecting your important files and data in today's evolving ransomware landscape requires a different approach to cybersecurity. Ransomware attacks are increasing 500% year over year, with high-impact, headline-making incidents continuously growing in volume and scope. Cybercriminals are getting bolder, their attacks are becoming more sophisticated, and ransom payments keep getting bigger—and no industry is off-limits. Meanwhile, yesterday's anti-malware and anti-ransomware tools just aren't the best defense anymore.
Modern Attacks Require Modern Defenses
Take a look at how Zscaler provides ransomware protection to disrupt every stage of the ransomware attack lifecycle in ways legacy antivirus and other security tools can’t.
Modern ransomware attack lifecycle
Legacy security architecture failure
Zscaler ransomware prevention
The modern ransomware attack lifecycle
Today’s cyberattackers use sophisticated tactics to bypass conventional ransomware detection and hide in trusted and encrypted traffic. They move through the network and steal data, threatening to publish it if ransoms aren’t paid. Once they have what they need, they execute the ransomware, encrypting data and wreaking havoc.

Legacy security architectures fail to stop modern ransomware
Traditional next-generation firewall functionality and security point products introduce blind spots, complexity, and high costs, all resulting in significant risk. These legacy approaches make it cost-prohibitive to inspect encrypted files and traffic, allowing attackers hidden within to move laterally to infect other systems.

Stop ransomware at every stage of the attack lifecycle
The Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange™ prevent attackers from discovering, exploiting, or infecting users and apps by making those users and apps invisible, only accessible to authorized users or devices through the Zero Trust Exchange. It inspects all inbound and outbound traffic inline, encrypted or not, keeping the good in and the bad out. Authenticated users and devices connect directly to the applications they need, never to the network—so even if an attacker does get past your authentication, they can't move laterally to steal or encrypt data.

Three Secrets to Stopping Ransomware Cold
Bryan Lee, Zscaler product manager and ransomware expert, provides details on top ransomware campaigns, novel techniques they’re using to exploit weaknesses, and new ways to keep users and data safe.
Ransomware Protection with a True Zero Trust Architecture
Ransomware can be prevented. Lead your business forward with confidence by leveraging a holistic zero trust platform for today's cloud-first hybrid workforce.

Prevent compromise
Protect your enterprise with the industry's most comprehensive zero trust platform. It delivers all key security controls as an edge service, close to every end user, branch, or enterprise headquarters.

Prevent lateral movement
Eliminate the risk of lateral movement by directly connecting users and devices to apps, not the network.

Prevent data loss
Stop data loss with the industry’s most holistic data protection solution that spans managed and unmanaged devices, servers, public cloud, and cloud apps.
Relevant Products
Zscaler Internet Access
Zscaler Internet Access
Stop ransomware infections with artificial intelligence-powered security services, delivered at the edge, close to every user
Prevent data theft with holistic, integrated data loss prevention that spans managed and unmanaged desktop and mobile devices, servers, public clouds, and cloud apps
10x Gartner Magic Quadrant Leader for Secure Web Gateways, aligned with the SASE framework for comprehensive enterprise security
Zscaler Private Access
Zscaler Private Access
Stop lateral movement to eliminate widespread ransomware infections and contain the scope of an attack
Zscaler Workload Segmentation
Zscaler Workload Segmentation
Prevent ransomware from moving between workloads and servers to maintain business continuity and safeguard data stored in the cloud
How the Zero Trust Exchange Excels in Ransomware Protection
Legacy approach
Zscaler Zero Trust
Exchange
Prevent Compromise
Legacy approach
Traditional next-generation firewalls can’t perform full SSL inspection without degrading performance, so most encrypted traffic goes uninspected, leaving blind spots.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
A unique, infinitely scalable cloud-based proxy architecture provides full visibility into all incoming and outgoing SSL traffic and applies inline protections to stop advanced attacks.
Legacy approach
Out-of-band sandbox appliances and cloud analysis services allows unknown attacks to pass through, sending an alert only after a ransomware threat has reached its destination.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Our cloud native, AI-powered inline sandbox quarantines unknown files and stops attacks from entering your enterprise—all at line speed.
Legacy approach
Traditional security solutions only distribute protections to perimeter appliances, limiting their coverage and effectiveness.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
More than 200,000 security updates are shared daily across the entire Zero Trust Exchange, protecting users and applications everywhere.
Legacy approach
Legacy VPNs open commonly exploited, vulnerable firewalls to the internet and bring remote users onto the network, increasing exposure and risk.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Inside-out connections keep apps and infrastructure invisible to unauthorized users. Further, remote users receive application access without gaining network access.
Legacy approach
Requires a separate browser isolation service, with its own configuration and administration, which can lead to inconsistent policies and user experiences.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler Cloud Browser Isolation is part of the integrated inline proxy-based cloud security stack, preventing the delivery of ransomware.
Legacy approach
Traditional ransomware and malware protection strategies require multiple appliances and subscription services to scale and keep up with new attack vectors and techniques.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
The industry's largest security cloud delivers fully integrated cloud firewall, cloud sandbox, advanced threat protection, cloud browser isolation, and data loss prevention as edge services, blocking more than 100 million daily threats without the need for any appliances.
Legacy approach
Network-centric firewalls are converted to virtual machines that do not fit in a cloud environment, resulting in inconsistent policies and configurations as well as increasing operational complexity and costs.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Unique cloud-first proxy architecture enables consistent policies regardless of user, location, and network without any need for hardware or virtual machines.
Legacy approach
Traditional network security does not provide any insight or protection against threats traversing workload-to-workload or workload-to-internet communication.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler Workload Segmentation (ZWS) detects unauthorized channels and stops C2 communication between workloads and to the outside world, from the cloud or data center.
Prevent Lateral Movement
Legacy approach
Legacy network security segmentation relies on an array of appliances, resulting in bloated policies that are hard to manage, suboptimal for stopping lateral movement, and easily compromised.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler’s zero trust architecture provides users with secure, direct access to internal and cloud apps with Zscaler Private Access (ZPA), applications are never exposed which eliminates the ability for an attacker to move laterally.
Legacy approach
Traditional networks are flat and allow excessive access via unprotected pathways that allow attackers to easily move laterally in the cloud and data center environments.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler Workload segmentation (ZWS) eliminates the attack surface and lateral movement with identity-based protection for your workloads, simplified policy and real-time visibility.
Legacy approach
Legacy architectures enable attackers to easily find high-value data and assets on networks. When attackers access the data, it is often difficult to identify those actions as malicious until it is too late.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Active defense proactively lures attackers with decoy apps and system assets. As soon as these decoys are touched, security teams know instantly that the behavior is malicious.
Prevent Data Exfiltration
Legacy approach
Requires an additional SSL decryption overlay to inspect encrypted traffic, which adds cost and complexity.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler Data Loss Prevention eliminates redundancies, as SSL traffic is forwarded, decrypted, and inspected just once for policy to be applied.
Legacy approach
Requires complexity of multiple DLP solutions and policies across network appliances and endpoints in order to prevent data exfiltration.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler’s Cloud DLP unifies protection across all cloud channels, users, and devices regardless of location. Create one DLP policy that goes everywhere in order to secure data and prevent exfiltration.
Legacy approach
Requires an additional CASB solution to identify sensitive data exposure and scan for malware at rest in SaaS Platforms.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler CASB simplifies data protection with a unified approach that scans SaaS platforms for dangerous file sharing or malware, along with compliance violations.
Legacy approach
Traditional network security only allows access based on IP, Port and Protocols, increasing the risk of data exfiltration through infected machines running unknown software.
Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Zscaler workload Segmentation (ZWS) lowers risk by only allowing verified software to communicate with external entities.
ThreatLabz Ransomware Review: The Advent of Double-Extortion
ThreatLabz tracked ransomware campaigns for two years to analyze evolving techniques, exploits, and at-risk industries. Read about double-extortion, third-party attacks, DDoS, and other trends.
Relevant Videos
Hydro Aluminum Boosts Ransomware Protection with the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
Explore the Advanced Ransomware Attack Chain with Zscaler CISO Deepen Desai
Suggested Resources
Prevent compromise

Protect the enterprise with industry's most comprehensive zero trust platform that delivers all key security controls as an edge service, close to every end user, branch or enterprise headquarters.
Reveal hidden ransomware: Find every threat without compromising the user experience with unlimited inspection of all traffic, across all ports and protocols, including SSL
Stop attacks with AI-powered prevention: Instantly detect, prevent, and quarantine the most sophisticated ransomware, including never-before-seen variants, with best-in-class AI-powered security services.
Eliminate the attack surface: Prevent attackers from discovering, exploiting, or infecting users and apps by making them invisible to the internet and only accessible through the Zero Trust Exchange with proper identity
Protect cloud infrastructure from infection: Monitor, validate, and automatically address gaps in entitlements, security policy, and compliance caused by misconfiguration and overly-permissive access across all cloud environments
Prevent lateral movement

Eliminate the risk of lateral movement by directly connecting users and devices to apps, not the network.
Stop lateral spread of ransomware: Remove the risk of a single infected user compromising anything on the network with the world's first and leading integrated zero trust network access capability for remote and on-campus users from any device
Safeguard the cloud and data center: Extend zero trust-based lateral movement prevention to cloud workloads and data centers with groundbreaking identity-based microsegmentation
Get proactive with active defense: Identify and stop lateral movement attempts by proactively deploying decoy apps and lures to generate high-confidence alerts with little-to-no false positives, as part of a holistic active defense and deception strategy
Prevent data loss

Stop data loss with the industry’s most holistic data protection solution that spans managed and unmanaged devices, servers, public cloud, and cloud apps.
Shield your cloud apps from exposure: Get granular control of sanctioned and unsanctioned cloud apps while securing sensitive data at rest against theft or accidental exposure with best-in-class integrated CASB capabilities.
Minimize the risk of double extortion by protecting data: Safeguard sensitive data with granular DLP controls that identify and block data leakage or theft across all inline and SSL traffic in real time.
Extend data protection to the cloud: Prevent cloud breaches and data loss by identifying and closing dangerous misconfigurations in SaaS and public clouds