A new report reveals an increase in cyberattacks directed at financial institutions, food retailers and healthcare providers, with 60% of all attacks targeting these three key industries.

The latest quarterly Global Threat Intelligence Report, released this week by BlackBerry Limited, shows the BlackBerry Threat Research and Intelligence team stopped more than 1.5 million cyberattacks in the 89 days between Dec. 1, 2022 and Feb. 28, 2023. These threats included roughly 1.5 unique malware samples per minute, an increase from the previous reporting period’s average of one unique sample per minute.

The report also notes that ongoing tensions between the Western and Eastern countries are fueling a more fragmented world, which has consequences for the cybersecurity threat landscape as Western governments call for more cyber defenses to protect their citizens and infrastructure.

Other key report highlights include:

• Increasing cyberattacks in the healthcare industry. BlackBerry’s AI-driven prevention-first technology prevented 5,246 unique malware samples.
• Top 10 countries experiencing cyberattacks in Q1 2023. The United States topped the list at 65% of stopped cyberattacks, followed by Brazil at 10%, Canada (7%) and Japan (7%).
• The top three industries targeted by attacks were financial institutions (34%), healthcare providers (14%) and food retailers (12%).