Cyber ​​threats 2021: the Trend Is Towards "Extortion Attacks"

Acronis presents its Acronis Cyberthreats Report, which takes stock of the state of threats and makes projections for the coming year. Given the protection and IT security challenges further amplified by the massive switch to teleworking due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Acronis warns that cybercrime will intensify in 2021 with criminals who will abandon data encryption attacks for the benefit of data exfiltration attacks.

Ransomware remains the main threat, with Maze ransomware being common to nearly half of known cases in 2020. Acronis Cyberthreats report, however, highlights a growing trend among cybercriminals to want to increase their financial earnings. Not content with getting ransoms for decrypting infected data, they steal proprietary, sometimes embarrassing data before encrypting it. So, if the victim does not pay, they can threaten to publicly reveal the stolen files. Acronis points out that more than 1,000 companies suffered data theft as a result of a ransomware attack in 2020, a trend that is expected to accelerate next year, overtaking the encryption strategy.

“Even more than in previous years, 2020 will have posed an incredible number of challenges for IT professionals, as well as businesses and their service providers,” notes Stas Protassov, Acronis co-founder and chief technology officer. “Criminals adapt really very quickly to the new IT context. By analyzing the activity, attacks and trends detected and presenting our findings, we hope to be able to help our partners and the IT community as a whole to be better prepared. "

Key takeaways from the Acronis Cyberthreats Report

• Intensification of attacks targeting teleworkers. 31% of large global companies suffered daily cyber attacks in 2020. But more frequent attacks from teleworkers are to be expected in 2021, as the lines of defense of systems outside the corporate network are easier to compromise to gain access to internal data.

• Automation of ransomware attacks that will claim new victims. Rather than casting a wide net, criminals will focus their ransomware attacks on the most lucrative victims. It is much more profitable to break into a network to steal data from multiple companies than to attack one company at a time. While there will always be casualties in small businesses, cloud environments and organizations like those of managed service providers will become prime targets as their systems provide access to multiple customer data.

• Obsolescence of legacy solutions. The need to block new, increasingly sophisticated, and frequent malware, makes traditional antimalware solutions obsolete. The average lifespan of a malware sample in 2020 was only 3.4 days. With automation, the number of malware samples will continue to climb. Organizations will need to find new agile protection approaches to stay ahead of new threats. Simple, stand-alone security and backup solutions will no longer suffice.

Responses Better Adapted to New Threats

"All the trends in cyber attacks show that traditional cybersecurity solutions and strategies fail, most often due to weak technologies and human errors, two aspects that are preventable," adds Candid Wüest, vice president in charge of cyber protection research at Acronis and co-author of the report. “As cybercriminals keep evolving their attacks, organizations need to strengthen their protection and security. Sufficiently integrated and automated comprehensive cyber protection solutions eliminate complexity, optimize performance, and streamline the inevitable return to normal every time an attack is successful. "

Acronis is a pioneer in cyber protection, which encompasses and integrates data protection, cybersecurity, and endpoint management technologies. To protect all data, applications, and systems, Acronis solutions cover the five SAPAS vectors of Cyber ​​Protection: reliability, accessibility, confidentiality, authenticity, and security.

Scope of the Report 2020 Acronis Cyberthreats Report

The 2020 edition of the Acronis Cyberthreats Report examines attack and threat data collected by the global network of Cyber ​​Protection Operation Centers (CPOCs), which monitor and explore cyber threats 24/7. More than 100,000 unique endpoints around the world, equipped since May 2020 with Acronis Cyber ​​Protect, have collected malware data targeting endpoints over the period from June to October.

Find the Best Antivirus to Protect From Cyber Threats 2021

The report sheds light on the main security trends and those related to threats observed by CPOC centers in 2020, it studies the major malware families and the corresponding statistics, it explores the most dangerous ransomware groups, as well as the vulnerabilities promoting successful attacks, and concludes with Acronis' security forecast and recommendations for 2021.