Verizon has released its highly anticipated 16th annual Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), offering valuable insights into the cybersecurity landscape. Based on the analysis of over 16,000 security incidents and approximately 5,200 breaches, the report highlights the role of human error in many breaches and the skyrocketing costs associated with ransomware attacks.
According to the report, the median cost of ransomware incidents has more than doubled in the past two years, reaching $26,000. While only 7% of cases reported losses, victims who experienced financial impacts lost between $1 million and $2.25 million. Verizon suggests that although the ransom amounts demanded by threat actors may be lower for smaller companies, the overall recovery costs are increasing due to the added expenses of restoring their IT infrastructure alongside existing technical debt.
Ransomware attacks accounted for 24% of the cybersecurity incidents analyzed by Verizon, with the past two years witnessing a higher number of attacks compared to the previous five years combined. The report also highlights the significant role of human involvement in approximately 75% of the breaches examined.
Social engineering played a crucial part in many of these attacks, particularly in business email compromise (BEC) campaigns, which have more than doubled since the previous year and constituted over half of the incidents involving social engineering. Chris Novak, Managing Director of Cybersecurity Consulting at Verizon Business, emphasized the growing cybersecurity threat posed by senior leadership within organizations. Due to their access to sensitive information and potential security protocol exceptions, senior executives are often among the least protected individuals. Strengthening the protection of senior leadership is crucial to prevent costly system intrusions in the face of increasingly sophisticated social engineering techniques.
The DBIR further reveals that stolen credentials were utilized in almost half of the breaches as the initial access point to organizations' systems. Phishing attacks accounted for 12% of breaches, followed by vulnerability exploitation at 5%.
Financial motivation was the driving force behind 95% of observed attacks in the past year, with only a small percentage involving espionage as the primary objective.
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