Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1269815
18 PCB007 MAGAZINE I JUNE 2020 Matties: They probably realize that these peo- ple could be anywhere in the world, and it's probably pretty unlikely to find them. Cormier: At the same time, there are so many different municipalities and infrastructures be- ing hit with ransomware that it has to be a pri- ority for them to be investigated. Ryder: The city of New Orleans got hit the same time we did. I understand the infrastructure of a city is far more important to society than a circuit board shop is, so their priorities go, as Eric said, with municipalities. Matties: It's amazing how widespread this problem is. Why aren't more people talking about it and protecting themselves? Hopeful- ly, the point of this whole interview is to get to that level. Ryder: You don't hear much about it in the news. The first few issues that we heard about it seemed to be buried on page 12, and then you don't hear anything more about it. Nobody is immune to this stuff. They've encrypted hos- pitals and things of that sort, and a lot of them have chosen to pay, but we were advised by the feds not to pay. There's no honor amongst thieves. There's no guarantee that if we paid we would get our stuff back, and they'd leave us alone. There's nothing to say they wouldn't come back a week later and do the same thing. Cormier: We also heard from technical sourc- es that some paid to receive what is called a decryption key tool but depending on file siz- es and things of that nature, it wouldn't work 100% of the time. They had to hire in anoth- er firm to rebuild a decryption tool based off what they received to help them get data back that wasn't always 100% recoverable. Matties: Even if you pay, you still have to go through all that diligence of what you've done to rebuild your systems for your own peace of mind. Ryder: Yes. It may shorten the time it takes you to get fully operational again by paying, but if you're looking at it from a fiscal standpoint, at the end of the day, we're in it a lot more than we would have been for the price of the ran- som, and that's through lost revenue as well as damage. Many people lost a lot of hours. We didn't have anything for them to do, so the damage was very far-reaching. Matties: It's not just your shop; it's also about all your employees not working for a month. Ryder: It impacted customers on the local level here. All of a sudden, for a period of a month, there were no quick turns being made in the Northwest. Matties: In terms of customers, did they stick with you? Cormier: It's hard to say, definitively, that all of them stuck with us. They were all sympa- thetic, and they were supportive when it made sense, but some of them have moved on. At the same time, COVID-19 showed up before we were through with the ransomware problem. It's hard to say what the issue with the cus- tomers is in a lot of cases. Matties: Are things picking up for you now? I hear it's quite busy out there. Ryder: We see a bit of an up and down on a daily basis. Unfortunately, in the Seattle mar- ket, we're heavily influenced by a big airplane manufacturer, and they're kind of slow right There's no honor amongst thieves. There's no guarantee that if we paid we would get our stuff back, and they'd leave us alone.