FireEye’s research has revealed that currently there are hundreds of unique hacking groups consisting of active cybercriminals these days.
Statistics-
- There are more than 1900 active hacker groups which includes APTs, threat actors ho are financially motivated, and other uncategorized groups.
- In 2020 itself, 514 new malwares were deployed with the top categories among the being backdoors (36%), downloaders (16%), droppers (8%), launchers (7%), and ransomware (5%).
- 81% of these tools were developed privately while 19% of them were made public.
The targeted sectors like business, healthcare, hospitality and retail, remained constant throughout the year. The most prevalent attacks on organizations came from ransomware and multifaceted extortion. The attack surface saw a significance increase due the shift to remote working and increased use of knowledge sharing platforms, videoconference and other such platforms. 246 distinct threat group were involved in various intrusions that were undergone last year. Among these, 161 are newly tracked actors.
Conclusion-
The pandemic has forced the increase of use of the use of digital media and this has given the attackers and increase in the attack surface. Not only the number, but the attackers have also grown in the sophistication of the attacks. The victims have to go through a lot of pressure of paying the ransom amount and these attacks are not going to be diminished in near future. So, it is best for organizations and individuals to be aware about these attacks and stay safe.
