Why are ransomware attacks becoming more difficult for MSPs to stop?

Modern ransomware combines phishing, stolen credentials, AI-driven social engineering, and Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS), allowing attackers to scale sophisticated campaigns faster than traditional defenses can respond. Treat email, identity, and endpoints as a single attack surface rather than separate security controls. Train users to recognize AI-generated phishing attempts alongside traditional scams. Prioritize rapid detection because attackers often move from initial access to encryption in hours. Continuously validate backups and recovery procedures instead of assuming they will work during an incident. Learn more about evolving ransomware tactics.

What attack paths should MSPs prioritize to reduce ransomware risk in 2026?

Identity compromise, phishing, compromised endpoints, and AI-assisted social engineering represent the highest-impact attack paths because they frequently precede ransomware deployment. Deploy phishing-resistant email security alongside identity monitoring. Continuously monitor privileged accounts for unusual authentication activity. Detect compromised endpoints before attackers establish persistence. Correlate email, endpoint, and identity telemetry to identify multi-stage attacks earlier. Explore the top identity-focused defenses.

Why is ransomware increasingly an identity problem rather than just a malware problem?

Attackers often compromise user identities first, then leverage legitimate access to move laterally, disable defenses, and deploy ransomware with fewer detectable indicators. Monitor impossible travel, risky sign-ins, and privilege escalation events. Limit standing administrative privileges through least-privilege policies. Protect cloud identities alongside on-premises accounts. Investigate suspicious authentication activity before encryption begins. Find out how attackers aren’t breaking in anymore; they are logging in.

How can MSPs use Guardz to improve ransomware resilience across client environments?

Guardz enables MSPs to standardize prevention, detection, and response across tenants, reducing operational complexity while strengthening protection against modern ransomware campaigns. Apply consistent security policies across all managed clients. Detect phishing, identity abuse, and endpoint threats from one platform. Demonstrate measurable security outcomes through centralized visibility. Respond faster by correlating alerts across email, identities, and endpoints. Explore how to build an effective MSP security stack.

31 Ransomware Statistics MSPs Cannot Ignore in 2026

Jordan Snapper

Updated on: July 31, 2026

In This Article

Ransomware Is Getting More Sophisticated to Combat
Ransomware Deployment Has Become Even More Accessible These Days
Ransomware Statistics 2025: What MSPs Need to Know
Notable Ransomware-Related Breaches of 2025
Most Common Ransomware Attack Vectors
The True Cost of Ransomware
Prevent Ransomware Attacks with Guardz

Ransomware Is Getting More Sophisticated to Combat
Ransomware Deployment Has Become Even More Accessible These Days
Ransomware Statistics 2025: What MSPs Need to Know
Notable Ransomware-Related Breaches of 2025
Most Common Ransomware Attack Vectors
The True Cost of Ransomware
Prevent Ransomware Attacks with Guardz

Key takeaways

Ransomware remains a major MSP risk: Ransomware is advancing through RaaS, AI, and social engineering, with a record 85 active extortion groups in Q3 2025.
SMBs face high exposure: Only 14% of SMBs are prepared for ransomware, while 75% could not continue operating after an attack and 88% experienced ransomware-driven breaches.
Phishing and identity attacks dominate: Email breaches, phishing, compromised credentials, endpoints, and identity infrastructure are identified as the main ransomware attack vectors.
Recovery is costly and uncertain: High recovery costs, extended downtime, repeat attacks after payment, and continued data loss remain significant challenges.

Ransomware Is Getting More Sophisticated to Combat

Every email attachment might contain a malicious payload that an employee or C-level executive might accidentally open, providing threat actors with a foothold to decrypt files and hold them for exorbitant ransom fees, often turning recovery into a gamble where organizations may only receive partial data, or none at all.

Ransomware Deployment Has Become Even More Accessible These Days

Threat actors have expanded their illegal operations to include Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS), which provides cybercriminal “affiliates” with pre-built ransomware kits, payment infrastructure, and profit-sharing models to extort organizations with minimal effort.

That’s not factoring in AI and other advanced social engineering tactics, which can mimic writing semantics and scale attacks faster than defenders can respond.

Check Point Research found the number of active extortion groups in Q3 2025 rose to a record of 85 groups, the highest number observed to date.

Does that mean you should be concerned, as an MSP?

We’ve put together a step-by-step guide you can take in the event of a ransomware attack, but here are 31 sobering ransomware statistics from 2025 that you cannot afford to ignore moving forward in 2026 and beyond.

Ransomware Statistics 2025: What MSPs Need to Know

Only 14% of SMBs are prepared to face an attack. Spin.AI
41% of IT and cybersecurity teams say they have increased anxiety or stress about future attacks. The State of Ransomware 2025
75% of SMBs could not continue operating if hit with ransomware. Spin.AI
78% of organizations were hit by ransomware in the past year. CrowdStrike State of Ransomware Survey

88% of SMBs experienced ransomware-driven breaches. 2025 Verizon DBIR
SMBs ($4M-$8M) were the most frequently targeted for ransomware attacks. Black Kite 2025 Ransomware Report
20% of organizations reported low confidence in their ransomware preparedness post-⁠attack. Veeam 2025 Ransomware Trends & Proactive Strategies
Nearly 50% of organizations fear that they can’t detect or respond as fast as AI-driven attacks can execute. CrowdStrike State of Ransomware Survey
7 out of 10 organizations experienced an attack in the past year, and of those attacked, only 10% recovered more than 90% of their data. Help Net Security
Only 22% of ransomware victims who felt “very well prepared” beforehand had recovered within 24 hours. CrowdStrike State of Ransomware Survey
Qilin was the most active ransomware group in Q3 2025, with an average of 75 victims per month. Check Point’s The State of Ransomware Q3 2025
85% of all ransomware attacks go unreported. BlackFog’s 2025 Q3 Ransomware Report

Ingram Micro was hit with a massive ransomware attack in 2025, resulting in 3.5 TB of stolen sensitive data and projected losses of up to $136 million per day. The Register
The Medusa ransomware group was responsible for the theft of 834 GB of data from Comcast, with a $1.2M ransom demand. HackRead
In April 2025, UK retail giant Marks & Spencer (M&S) was hit by a major DragonForce ransomware attack, linked to the Scattered Spider group, which was believed to have cost over £300M in lost profits and £3.8M in daily sales losses. Technology Magazine
The Madusa ransomware group stole over 1TB of data from NASCAR with a $4M ransom demand. Comparitech

Most Common Ransomware Attack Vectors

71% of organizations that had experienced an email breach were also hit with ransomware. The Ransomware Insights Report 2025
Phishing accounted for 52% of all attacks targeting MSPs in 2025 as compared to 30% in 2024. Help Net Security
19% of ransomware incidents in 2025 had a malicious email as the root cause. Statista
23% of ransomware incidents were the result of compromised credentials. Statista
26% of ransomware incidents in 2025 involved compromised endpoints. Hornetsecurity Ransomware Impact Report 2025
77% of security professionals view AI-driven phishing as a serious and emerging threat. Hornetsecurity Ransomware Impact Report 2025
83% of ransomware attacks compromised the identity infrastructure. Semperis Ransomware Risk Report
15% of ransomware victims who paid the ransom did not receive decryption keys. Semperis Ransomware Risk Report

The True Cost of Ransomware

Ransomware is projected to cost victims over $275 billion by 2031. Cybersecurity Ventures
83% of paying victims were attacked again, and 93% lost data regardless of payment. CrowdStrike State of Ransomware Survey
The average ransomware payment was $1M, and the average recovery cost was $1.5M. The State of Ransomware 2025
Only 29% of ransomware victims said their payment matched the initial demand. The State of Ransomware 2025
Most organizations take about 21 days to recover from a ransomware attack. Spin.AI
A single hour of downtime costs approximately $300,000 for most enterprises. Spin.AI
The average cost of an extortion or ransomware incident reached $5.08M when disclosed by an attacker. IBM

Check out our other cybersecurity threat-related statistics blogs and key findings here:

Small Business Cyberattacks Rise in 2025: Guardz Mid-Year Findings

33 Phishing Statistics in 2025 Every MSP Should Know About

36 Endpoint Security Statistics MSPs Should Know About in 2025

Prevent Ransomware Attacks with Guardz

Take a proactive security approach to ransomware prevention with Guardz. The Guardz unified cybersecurity platform provides MSPs with LLM-enhanced threat detection to uncover suspicious patterns in emails, where a single malicious attachment can deliver a ransomware payload and initiate a full-scale attack.

Guardz integrates with Check Point’s Harmony Email Security (formerly Avanan) to safeguard your inbox from phishing attempts and BEC attacks, so you can confidently demonstrate results and measurable outcomes to clients while preventing ransomware. A winning strategy. Schedule a demo today to learn how Guardz can help protect your clients from ransomware.

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MSP

Cyber Security

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Jordan Snapper

Cybersecurity Content Creator

Jordan is a Cybersecurity Content Creator and community builder. He has written for many cybersecurity companies and knows more stats about a data breach than IBM.

Frequently Asked Questions

Modern ransomware combines phishing, stolen credentials, AI-driven social engineering, and Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS), allowing attackers to scale sophisticated campaigns faster than traditional defenses can respond.

Treat email, identity, and endpoints as a single attack surface rather than separate security controls.
Train users to recognize AI-generated phishing attempts alongside traditional scams.
Prioritize rapid detection because attackers often move from initial access to encryption in hours.
Continuously validate backups and recovery procedures instead of assuming they will work during an incident.

Learn more about evolving ransomware tactics.

Identity compromise, phishing, compromised endpoints, and AI-assisted social engineering represent the highest-impact attack paths because they frequently precede ransomware deployment.

Deploy phishing-resistant email security alongside identity monitoring.
Continuously monitor privileged accounts for unusual authentication activity.
Detect compromised endpoints before attackers establish persistence.
Correlate email, endpoint, and identity telemetry to identify multi-stage attacks earlier.

Explore the top identity-focused defenses.

Attackers often compromise user identities first, then leverage legitimate access to move laterally, disable defenses, and deploy ransomware with fewer detectable indicators.

Monitor impossible travel, risky sign-ins, and privilege escalation events.
Limit standing administrative privileges through least-privilege policies.
Protect cloud identities alongside on-premises accounts.
Investigate suspicious authentication activity before encryption begins.

Find out how attackers aren’t breaking in anymore; they are logging in.

Guardz enables MSPs to standardize prevention, detection, and response across tenants, reducing operational complexity while strengthening protection against modern ransomware campaigns.