The sad truth today is that if you do suffer from a ransomware attack, while you can try the free tools featured below to counter it, chances are you are not going to be able to remove much of the ransomware that is now on the market.
However, there is some good news, the first of which is that ransomware has become much more targeted these days, so that ordinary users are less likely to suffer from it. There are also privacy and security tools for general users, such as a free VPN that could help keep you safer online.
Additionally, most of the best antivirus software and anti-malware software will have protections against ransomware built-in, so we’ve featured these at the top of our list – after all, prevention is better than treatment.
On top of this, for ordinary users backing up their most import files offline or online through a cloud storage solution, chances are they can recover them if you access them from a different machine.
For businesses, really it’s long past time to have a full disaster recovery software platform in place, to ensure that – should a ransomware attack get past your existing endpoint security – you can at least recover everything you need from a recent or even real-time backup.
Best protection against ransomware-at a glance
- Bitdefender Antivirus Plus
- Avast Antivirus
- Webroot SecureAnywhere Antivirus
- AVG Antivirus
- ESET NOD32 Antivirus
Best ransomware removal software-at a glance
- Malwarebytes Anti-Malware
- Avast Free Ransomware Decryption Tools
- Trend Micro Ransomware File Decryptor
- Trend Micro Screen Unlocker Tools
- Kaspersky Anti-Ransomware Tool
Ransomware on your home computer is bad enough, but an infection that locks you out of your business PCs could be an absolute disaster. Your accounts, customer data, client information and work could all be encrypted – and it could affect multiple machines on the same network.
