Survey Reports More Targeted Attacks on Businesses
A survey of nearly 4,000 IT managers across 27 countries by Kaspersky Lab found that targeted attacks have risen year-over-year (YoY), and also identified the business sectors most likely to be targeted.
The Moscow-based antivirus and internet security software group said that 12% of all businesses surveyed reported a targeted attack this year, against the 9% average reported in 2013 and 2012.
Globally, 18% of organisations in the government and defence sector reported at least one targeted attack within the past 12 months. The rate of targeted attacks reported within the sector was the highest rate reported in this year‘s survey, compared with the global average of 12% reported across all business sectors.
Other business segments that reported targeted attacks at a higher-than-average rate, included the telecommunications industry where 17% of businesses reported attacks in the past 12 months, and the financial services and transportation/logistics sectors, both of which reported targeted attacks at a rate of 16%.
In partnership with B2B International, the results were published in Kaspersky Lab‘s 2014 IT Security Risks summary report, which outlines the types of internal and external security risks most often encountered by businesses across a variety of industries, along with the costs associated with an IT security incident and the types of data most lost as a result of these attacks.
Last September 2013, Kaspersky Lab released its analysis of the Icefog targeted attack campaign, a multi-year campaign which focused on military, telecommunications, shipping and research organizations in South Korea and Japan.
In February this year, the group reported the discovery of The Mask cyber-espionage campaign, which included victims in 31 countries around the world, including governments and government-related agencies.