Ransomware emerges as top data security threat: IBM Security
IBM Security on Monday announced results from its 2018 IBM X-Force Threat Intelligence Index which found the number of records breached dropped nearly 25 per cent in 2017, as cybercriminals shifted their focus to launching ransomware and destructive attacks that lock or destroy data unless the victim pays a ransom.
Last year, more than 2.9 billion records were reported breached, down from 4 billion disclosed in 2016. While the number of records breached was still significant, ransomware provided the most common threat in 2017 as attacks such as WannaCry, NotPetya, and Bad Rabbit caused chaos across industries without contributing to the total number of compromised records reported.
Other key findings included:
• A historic 424 per cent jump in breaches related to misconfigured cloud infrastructure, largely due to human error;
• For the second year in a row, the financial services industry suffered the most cyberattacks, accounting for 27 per cent of attacks across related industries.
The IBM X-Force Threat Intelligence Index is comprised of insights and observations from data analysed via hundreds of millions of protected endpoints and servers across nearly 100 countries. IBM X-Force runs thousands of spam traps around the world and monitors tens of millions of spam and phishing attacks daily while analysing billions of web pages and images to detect fraudulent activity and brand abuse.