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Barracuda threat report reveals spike in ransomware to more than 1.2 million per month
arracuda , a trusted partner
B and leading provider of cloud-first security solutions , has released its fourth-annual threat research report on ransomware . The new report looks at ransomware attack patterns that occurred between August 2021 and July 2022 .
A closer look at ransomware trends
For the 106 highly publicised attacks Barracuda researchers analysed , the dominant targets are still five key industries : education ( 15 %), municipalities ( 12 %), healthcare ( 12 %), infrastructure ( 8 %) and financial ( 6 %): more than doubled compared to last year ’ s report .
• While attacks on municipalities increased only slightly , Barracuda analysis over the past 12 months showed that ransomware attacks on educational institutions more than doubled and attacks on the healthcare and financial verticals tripled .
• This year , Barracuda researchers dug in deeper on these highly publicised attacks to see which other industries are starting to be targeted . Service providers were hit the most and ransomware attacks on automobile , hospitality , media , retail , software and technology organisations all increased as well . sophisticated and extremely hard to handle for small businesses .
To get a closer look at how ransomware is affecting smaller businesses , the report details three examples that researchers have seen through Barracuda SOC-as-a-Service , the anatomy of each attack and the solutions that can help stop these attacks .
• The number of ransomware attacks increased year-over-year across each of these five industry verticals and attacks against other industries
Most ransomware attacks don ’ t make headlines , though . Many victims choose not to disclose when they get hit and the attacks are often
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Number of Blockchain hacks on the rise
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he number of cyberattacks
T centred around Blockchain technology , a transaction record database commonly used for cryptocurrency exchange , is on the rise , according to Cambridge-based IT security firm , The SecOps Group .
With just three hacks causing damage of almost US $ 1 billion so far this year , the pressure is on for Blockchain developers
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to identify and patch security issues before they get exploited in the wild . Fortunately , the security consultancy The SecOps Group has launched a Blockchain smart contract security audit to help them do just that .
There are two main methods of successful attack : one relies on social engineering tricks such as convincing a victim to send cryptocurrency to an
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attacker ’ s wallet ; the second and more complicated type of hack requires a deep understanding of Blockchain smart contracts and associated components , such as side-chain , crosschain , wallets , understanding of various protocols and more .
Three of the most recent and significant attacks on Blockchain were :
• Solana wallets attack – US $ 7 million – August 3 2022
• Axie Infinity Ronin bridge – US $ 625 million – March 28 2022
• Wormhole cross-chain bridge attack – US $ 325 million – February 2 2022
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With smart contracts playing a key role in automating several processes within a Blockchain , running an audit to examine and analyse its code is now crucial for preventing attacks . Implemented effectively , it will help to discover errors , issues and security vulnerabilities in the code and suggest ways to fix them . |
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