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Positive Technologies: 60% of 2019 attacks were targeted

Positive Technologies: 60% of 2019 attacks were targeted

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Positive Technologies: 60% of 2019 attacks were targeted

Positive Technologies experts have analysed the 2019 cybersecurity threat landscape. The analysis shows that the percentage of targeted attacks is much greater than that of mass attacks and that the top target sectors were government, industry, healthcare, science and education and finance.

According to the study, the number of unique cyberattacks increased by 19% and the percentage of targeted attacks increased by five percentage points compared to 2018, now standing at 60%. Positive Technologies’ experts noted that the number of attacks increased every quarter. In Q1, 47% of attacks were targeted. At the year-end, this figure had grown to 67%. 

Alexey Novikov, Director of PT Expert Security Centre, said: “Every year we see new groups of attackers specialising in advanced persistent threats. During 2019, the Positive Technologies Expert Security Centre (PT ESC) tracked APT attacks by 27 groups, ranging from well-known groups, such as Cobalt, Silence and APT28 to relatively unknown newcomers. Companies are paying closer attention to cybersecurity, implementing and using special security tools (such as anti-APT solutions) to detect and prevent complex attacks. This makes it easier to detect malicious activity more accurately and significantly reduces dwell time. Because of this, information on individual incidents and particular tactics and tools used by different APT groups becomes public knowledge and can be used as intelligence to bolster countermeasures.”

Experts believe that companies should shift their attention from prevention of attacks in the perimeter to timely detection and response inside the network, regularly checking any previous attacks.

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