As a result of major cyberattacks in 2020, security leaders were forced to be even more cognizant of their approach to protecting their organization, often forcing them to refine and future proof their approaches to this new world of security. After watching the events of 2020 and analyzing threat actors’ approaches, here’s what I expect to see in 2021:
Indeed, over the past few years, ransomware operators have shifted tactics, moving from widespread targeting intended to collect smaller ransoms from several entities to being more selective in what organizations are targeted and setting larger ransom amounts. One recent tactic revealed ransomware operators using virtual machine to evade detection, which was quickly adopted by other groups.
Just like every company in the business world, cybercriminals are looking to boost their sales. With ransomware, they’ve found a way to force victims to pay. And in their quest, cyber attackers are borrowing a playbook from sales teams in legitimate businesses.
Kia Motors America has allegedly suffered a ransomware attack by the DoppelPaymer gang. The gang is demanding $20 million for a decryptor and not to leak stolen data, according to news reports.
Ransomware attacks, phishing scams, fake news and several other cyberattacks made headlines in 2020. As millions of Americans shifted to remote work for business continuity, cybercriminals sprung into action, evolving their social engineering tactics. Smishing and vishing are new variants that are fast gaining traction, targeting mobile phones.
The National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force (NCIJTF) has released a joint-sealed ransomware factsheet to address current ransomware threats and provide information on prevention and mitigation techniques.
VMware Carbon Black released 2020 data that paints a holistic view of the threats healthcare organizations face and should be prepared for in 2021. Researchers found that there were 239.4 million attempted attacks targeting healthcare alone in 2020. VMware Carbon Black was also able to identify the top five ransomware families plaguing the healthcare industry including:
As the headlines showed, ransomware continued to be the weapon of choice in 2020, and extortionware is on the rise. While ransomware has become a tried and true method at this point, extortionware tactics are raising the stakes by threatening to expose sensitive information if the ransom is not paid.
The Sophos Rapid Response team published findings from its investigations into recent ransomware attacks that reveal a failure to keep close tabs on “ghost” account credentials of recently deceased employees can give cybercriminals a discreet foothold to launch an attack.
