As cybercriminals have access to more sophisticated tech, and new cyber threats emerge that add complexity to existing risks, such as AI, the Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing, so that bar continues to be raised and organisations can feel hopeless as their confidential data and critical assets fall prey to malicious attacks.
Hackers in the past may have been content with the challenge of what they could get into. Today, success is often measured by the amount of financial or even political damage one can inflict.
Emerging Cyber Threats in 2021 and Beyond
The coronavirus pandemic emerged as the biggest challenge for organisations in 2020 as cyber threats and data breaches grew in sophistication and volume. According to Microsoft, the number of breaches increased 273% in the first quarter compared to 2019, and saw pandemic-related phishing and social engineering attacks skyrocket to 30,000 per day in the US alone.
A UK Government 2022 survey shows that 39% of UK businesses identified a cyber attack in the last 12 months. Of them, the most common threat was phishing attempts (83%), and around one in five (21%) identified a more sophisticated attack type such as a denial of service, malware, or ransomware attack. 31% of these businesses and 26% of charities estimate they were attacked at least once a week.
Proportion of UK businesses identifying cyber attacks each year
Source: Gov.UK Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2022
Cybersecurity Threats
As the types of cyber threats continue to grow, these are some of the most common and prevalent cyberthreats that present-day organisations and users need to know about:
Malware attack
Malware refers to malicious programs that infect your system with the intent to corrupt or steal your data, and is commonly introduced through an email attachment, or an unsafe download that tricks you into allowing it through your anti-virus software.
Phishing
A phishing attack is when you receive an email appearing to be from an organisation or person that you trust asking for urgent action from you. This often requires you to click an email link that takes you to a dummy site that looks like the real thing but is a trap to capture your login credentials.
Ransomware
A form of malware that breaches an organisation's system and encrypts the information to render it inaccessible without a specific decryption key that will not be used unless a ransom payment is made. The attackers often threaten to completely destroy the data if their demands are not met.
Password attacks
Password attacks occur when a hacker gains access to the password information of an individual by ‘sniffing’ the connection to the network. This is often done in one of three ways - by guessing a weak or regularly used password, gaining access to a password database, or through social engineering.
Technology alone isn't enough to safeguard your business
Even with top-of-the-range endpoint protection, cyber criminals will find intelligent ways of getting through the cracks to enter your information systems. When they do, they can use sophisticated social engineering techniques to manipulate your employees into giving away sensitive information.
A Proactive Approach to Reducing Cyber Risk
Protect your organisation and your reputation by establishing some basic cyber defences.
Doing nothing is no longer an option. You can protect your organisation, and your reputation, by establishing basic cyber defences that prevent, detect or disrupt a cyber attack at the earliest opportunity to limit the business impact and potential for damage.
