"Sophisticated attacks have been increasing year over year. This has been reported many times, and the “why” hasn’t ever changed — but reporting through media channels has certainly made the attacks more visible to a wide audience. For cybercrime attacks, the No. 1 motivator is money. More companies are choosing to pay ransoms, so cybercrime has become more profitable than ever before. We are now regularly seeing hackers demanding ransoms for millions of dollars. It has been a repeatedly successful enterprise for these criminal actors.

Additionally, the rise of cryptocurrency provides hackers an additional layer of anonymity when they collect ransoms, since they are accepting payment in blockchain and cannot be tracked. This has been a dream for creators of ransomware — an easy way to collect payment and disappear into the night."