Ransomware activity has reported a tenfold increase in the last one year, as of June 2021, reveals recently released FortiGuard LabsGlobal Threat Landscape Report.
FortiGuard Labs data shows average weekly ransomware activity in June 2021 was more than tenfold higher than levels from one year ago. This demonstrates a consistent and overall steady increase over a year period. Attacks crippled the supply chains of multiple organizations, in particular sectors of critical importance, and impacted daily life, productivity, and commerce more than ever before.
Organizations in the telecommunications sector were the most heavily targeted followed by government, managed security service providers, automotive, and manufacturing sectors. In addition, some ransomware operators shifted their strategy away from email-initiated payloads to focusing on gaining and selling initial access into corporate networks further showing the continued evolution of Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) fueling cybercrime.
A key takeaway of the report is that ransomware remains a clear and present danger for all organizations regardless of industry or size. Organizations need to take a proactive approach with real-time endpoint protection, detection, and automated response solutions to secure environments along with a zero-trust access approach, network segmentation, and encryption.
Michael Joseph, Director System Engineering, India & SAARC, Fortinet said, “We are seeing an increase in effective and destructive cyberattacks affecting thousands of organizations in a single incident creating an important inflection point for the war on cybercrime. Now more than ever, everyone has an important role in strengthening the kill chain. Aligning forces through collaboration must be prioritized to disrupt cybercriminal supply chains. Shared data and partnership can enable more effective responses and better predict future techniques to deter adversary efforts. Continued cybersecurity awareness training, as well as AI-powered prevention, detection, and response technologies integrated across endpoints, networks, and the cloud, remain vital to counter cyber adversaries.”
