Emerging Cybersecurity Threats
Cybersecurity is a constantly evolving sector where both the threats and security measures constantly vie to outpace the other. Recent technological developments, especially in Artificial Intelligence (AI), have led to a growth in the sophistication of cyberattacks. At the same time, the adoption of new technologies, devices, and software as well as changing business needs expand the cyber attack surface, increasing business risk.
As new vulnerabilities emerge and threats are created, innovative countermeasures are required to combat them. Understanding these trends and changes helps organizations to find the solutions they need to manage their business risks.
This blog post gives an overview of the latest trends in cyber security.
Top Trends In Cyber Security Threats
In the last couple of years, many organizations have shifted towards remote work. While this was a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, it appears that a large proportion of the workforce will continue to work remotely.
Whatever the reason for remote work, from a cybersecurity perspective, working from home poses serious cybersecurity risks and is one of the biggest concerns among security professionals.
Home networks are nowhere near as secure as office networks, which have a slew of security measures managed and monitored by an IT team. Rigorous security vetting for the home network of remote employees is either not practicable or economically viable. Organizations can neither control which devices connect to their employees’ home networks nor enforce security standards for those devices.
In addition, most employees use their personal devices for work in some form. It is common to use a personal device for two-factor authentication, work email applications, and messaging applications such as Slack or Microsoft Teams. This blurs the line between personal and professional, increasing the security risks for the organization.
Since home networks are much softer targets, cybercriminals are increasingly attacking organizations via their remote employees. This means that organizations need to increase focus on the security challenges of distributed workforces, which includes not just endpoint security, but also home network security and continued security awareness training.
Ransomware is not new and has been around for decades. But it continues to be one of the most widespread and devastating threats. According to IBM Security’s Cost of Data Breach Report 2023, nearly one-quarter of attacks that left systems inoperable involved ransomware.
Over recent years, ransomware attacks have become more sophisticated and have evolved in several ways:
There has been a notable shift towards targeting critical infrastructure, including healthcare systems, government agencies, and essential services since such attacks maximize the impact on society, increasing the likelihood of ransom payments.
The use of double extortion tactics has become more prevalent. In addition to encrypting files, the attackers exfiltrate sensitive data and threaten to make it public unless a ransom is paid. This dual threat increases the pressure on victims to comply.
Now even non-technical individuals launch ransomware attacks due to the emergence of Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) models. Anyone can go on the dark web and purchase or rent ransomware variants and infrastructure, leading to a proliferation of attacks.
Ransomware attacks are no longer directed only at large corporations. Small and medium-sized businesses, municipalities, schools, and even individuals are increasingly becoming targets, as attackers seek to cast a wider net, seeking targets across a broad spectrum.
Threat actors have started targeting the supply chain, compromising software vendors and service providers to reach a large number of victims through a single attack.
Given the transformation of ransomware threats, organizations must update their cybersecurity strategies to mitigate the risk of attacks, implement robust security measures, and educate employees about the dangers of ransomware and their entry points such as phishing, malware, etc.
The rapid rise of AI has already had a profound impact on cybersecurity both from offensive and defensive perspectives.
Generative AI tools like ChatGPT have found several applications in cyber attacks - from drafting extremely convincing emails for phishing attacks to writing code for malware. Threat actors are also taking advantage of AI to automate their attacks. Although generative AI tools have built-in guardrails to prevent misuse, attackers can bypass such safety measures and use these AI tools to streamline and improve cyberattacks.
On the defensive side, AI presents a significant opportunity for robust, automated threat detection. One of the major challenges in IT security is the sheer volume of attacks and the number of false positives. Thanks to AI, organizations can now use AI and machine learning to quickly sift through large volumes of security logs and hone their security measures. AI also makes natural language processing and analysis of massive quantities much more efficient and faster, minimizing data security risks.
Overall, AI has several potential use cases both in the offensive and defensive realms of cybersecurity. Whichever side makes the most effective use of AI will have a notable edge.
IoT technology provides a connected digital identity to physical objects by networking them together so that the users can benefit from their data gathering and interconnectivity. However, this interconnectivity also means that if a cybercriminal gains access to even a single IoT device, they can practically access your entire IoT infrastructure and in the worst case even the entire network.
IoT is still a relatively new technology and all aspects of its implementation, especially security haven’t been completely hammered out. Additionally, unlike laptops and smartphones, IoT devices typically have low processing and storage capabilities. This makes it difficult to employ traditional security measures such as firewalls, antivirus, etc. on them. The greater the number of IoT devices on your network, the greater the number of potential entry points for malicious actors.
Due to these vulnerabilities, IoT devices are a soft target for hackers. Compromised IoT devices can also become part of IoT botnets, which are used for large-scale Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. However, a compromised IoT device is often the least of your concerns. IoT devices collect and transmit large amounts of data, which is much more valuable than the device itself. A compromised device can lead to data theft, which is a very serious concern.
For more information on IoT devices and infrastructure security, visit our earlier blog posts:
The growing adoption of the cloud received further impetus following the pandemic, which spurred the widespread adoption of remote working. With the rapid adoption of remote work, organizations have had to drastically increase their reliance on cloud-based services and infrastructure. While the cloud does offer a variety of benefits, including cost efficiency and scalability, it comes with its share of security risks.
Cloud security follows a shared security model, where the cloud provider is responsible for the security of the cloud infrastructure, and the customer is responsible for the protection of the cloud-based assets and compliance. While there are several tools available to ensure that can adequately meet their security responsibilities, the state of cloud security remains problematic.
Over the years, it has become apparent that IT security in general, and cloud security in particular, are more than technology problems. So, it is not surprising that the most common causes of breaches include privilege misuse, insecure interfaces, and misconfigurations.
What is often lacking is the realization that security measures such as Identity and Access Management (IAM), encryption, and Mobile Device Management (MDM), etc. go hand in hand with administrative measures such as security awareness training, robust policies, and good cyber hygiene.
Cyberattacks that rely on social engineering, such as phishing, have been around for a long time. The security measures, antivirus, anti-malware, Two-Factor Authentication (2FA), spam filters, etc., developed in response to such attacks have become highly effective in mitigating the threats.
However, amid the widespread adoption of remote work, social engineering attacks have become not only more rampant but also more sophisticated. Five of the biggest data breaches of 2022 involved the use of social engineering.
Attackers see remote workers as soft targets and use a variety of tactics to target them, a few common ones include
While security professionals are doing their best to stay a step ahead of the attackers, criminals are always on the lookout for new vulnerabilities and exploits. Given the ever-changing dynamics of cyberattacks, employee education is the most effective safeguard against social engineering attacks. Educating your employees on how social engineering works, common tactics used, and attack methods go a long way in preventing social engineering attacks from succeeding.
If you’d like to learn more about social engineering, refer to our earlier blog post: Complete Guide To Social Engineering
Conclusion
Business trends - remote work and cloud migration, technology trends - AI and IoT, and changes in the threat landscape - the evolution of ransomware and social engineering, all put immense pressure on organizations to streamline, monitor, and enhance their security architecture.
On one hand, changes in business processes, market demands, and trends are pushing businesses to adopt new technologies and business processes, increasing the attack surface. On the other hand, cybercriminals are constantly looking for attack vectors and new vulnerabilities to exploit.
Cybersecurity continues to evolve both on the attack and defense sides. So, businesses need to keep security front and center so that security teams are able to keep up.
Is your organization doing enough to keep up with the changing security landscape? If you like some assistance with improving your security posture, reach out to us by clicking the button below.
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