In their quarterly report, PandaLabs, the Security Operations Center at Panda Security, presents a rundown of the three most harrowing months in cybersecurity in recent years.
The Quarter in Numbers
This quarter has been defined by two major attacks: WannaCry and Petya. The first infected over 230,000 computers in May and caused losses of between one and four billion dollars. The second, a sort of aftershock of the WannaCry earthquake, ended up affecting companies in more than 60 countries despite appearing to target primarily Ukraine.
The attack data analyzed by PandaLabs on all devices protected by one of Panda Security’s solutions shows a 40% increase in attacks from unknown threats from the previous quarter. If we look at the type of client, home users and small businesses make up 3.81% of attacks, while in the case of medium and large companies the figure is 2.28%.
As for the percentage of devices attacked in each country, here are the ten most and ten least attacked:
Cybersecurity Trends
- The most sought-after exploits are “zero-day” vulnerabilities, which by definition are unknown and which allow attackers to compromise computers even if their software is updated.
- Cyberwarfare: WannaCry and Petya have shown us that government agencies won’t hesitate to carry out large-scale cyberattacks, and that anyone on the internet could end up becoming a collateral victim of such attacks.
- Ransomware is still on the rise, and will continue to be as long as there are victims willing to pay.
- Lost or stolen data is a problem that is occurring more and more frequently due to human error or negligence.
- IoT & Smart Cities: hyperconnected cities that are made up of networks of millions of devices will increase the overall reach of attacks, and the consequences will be more costly and more severe.
Traditional security solutions are not capable of dealing with attacks in which non-malicious tools and other advanced techniques are used. It is imperative to use security software appropriate to the level of threat that we are facing, such as Panda’s own Adaptive Defense.
The full report is available at http://www.pandasecurity.com/mediacenter/src/uploads/2017/07/Pandalabs-2017-Q2-EN.pdf
