Ransomware attacks are on the rise, and while all organizations can fall victim to this threat, a recent series of incidents shows that state and local governments are particularly lucrative targets. State and local governments may consider themselves better off individually if they paid an attacker's ransom, but collectively they would be better off if none of them ever paid. As Daniel Castro writes for Government Technology, the only way to stop these attacks is if governments make a firm commitment to not pay ransoms. By tying the hands of city and county officials, attackers will then turn their attention to more vulnerable and lucrative targets.
