The financial industry is the financial sector that suffers the most cyberattacks
Cybercrime is constantly growing, since the computer systems of individuals and prosecutors have a large amount of valuable or confidential information. That's why we see a lot of antivirus or VPN ads, but... What are the most sensitive sectors for cyberattacks?
Unsurprisingly, the financial sector is the most vulnerable to cyberattacks. This is perfectly logical, as the potential profit is enormous compared to demanding a much smaller ransom from thousands of people to unlock their systems. However, a company, especially a financial one, must have vast amounts of protected data , and a mistake can be extremely costly if it lacks a way to restore a backup.
The financial sector is the one who should take the most action against cyberattacks
A Netwrix study revealed that more than three-quarters of financial organizations detected an attack on their infrastructure this year. This figure was 77%, compared to 68% in other sectors. While slightly higher, it represents a greater focus of attention.
The figures come from a survey of more than 1.600 IT and security professionals in over 100 countries. The fact that attackers are targeting financial services means that their employees are at greater risk of falling victim to threats like phishing , which compromise the organization's security. Because sometimes, it only takes one person making a mistake for the entire system to be affected, as happened to Ibai and Linus Tech Tips , who were compromised by a file disguised as a PDF.
Dirk Schrader, Vice President of Security Research at Netwrix, commented that financial organizations are targeted by cybercriminals because they store large volumes of valuable information and manage access to funds. They possess valuable data, and disrupting operations causes major problems. We saw this with the recent RedSys outage , which wasn't a ransomware attack but made it impossible for virtually all of Spain to make card purchases.
He added that ransomware gangs believe financial institutions are more likely to pay larger ransoms than other sectors . This is because they need to recover their systems as quickly as possible, and it's more profitable for them to pay than to try to restore them and expose their vulnerability. According to Netwrix, companies should comply with insurance requirements and continuously improve their identity and access management and privileged access management.
