2016 was the year when ransomware reigned. Bad guys further weaponized extortion into malware, turning enterprises and end users into their cash cows by taking their crown jewels hostage. With 146 families discovered last year compared to 29 in 2015, ransomware’s rapid expansion and development are projected to spur cybercriminals into diversifying and expanding their platforms, capabilities, and techniques in order to accrue more targets.

Indeed, we’ve already seen them testing new waters by tapping the mobile user base, and more recently developing ransomware for other operating systems (OS) then peddling it underground to affiliates and budding cybercriminals. Linux.Encoder (detected by Trend Micro as ELF_CRYPTOR family) was reportedly the first for Linux systems; it targeted Linux web hosting systems through vulnerabilities in web-based plug-ins or software such as Magento’s. In Mac OS X systems, it was KeRanger (OSX_KERANGER)—found in tampered file-sharing applications and malicious Mach-O files disguised as a Rich Text Format (RTF) documents. Their common denominator? Unix.