13 August 2021
Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are at particular risk based on the attack trends seen during the first six months of the year, according to the recent cyberthreats mid-year report by Acronis.
The research revealed that four out of every five businesses experienced a cybersecurity breach in the first half of 2021 as a result of a weakness in their third-party vendor ecosystem. That comes as the average cost of a data breach has risen to about $3.56m - while the typical ransomware payment has risen by 33% to more than $100,000.
“While the increase in attacks affects organisations of all sizes, something that’s under-reported in the coverage of current cyberthreat trends is the impact on the small business community,” said Candid Wüest, Acronis VP of cyber protection research. “Unlike larger corporations, small and medium-sized companies don’t have the money, resources, or staffing expertise needed to counter today’s threats. That’s why they turn to IT service providers – but if those service providers are compromised, those SMBs are at the mercy of the attackers.”
By utilising supply-chain attacks against managed service providers (MSPs), attackers gain access to both the MSP business and all of its clients. As seen in the SolarWinds breach last year and the Kaseya VSA attack earlier in 2021, one successful attack means they can breach hundreds or thousands of SMBs downstream.
The report also said Phishing emails increased 62% from Q1 to Q2, with criminals using social engineering tactics to mislead naive users into downloading harmful files or links. That spike is of particular concern since 94% of malware is delivered by email.
In 2020, more than 1,300 victims of ransomware had their data publicly leaked following an attack, as cybercriminals look to maximise the financial gain from successful incidents. During the first half of 2021, more than 1,100 data leaks have already been published – which projects a 70% increase for the year.
Furthermore, the reliance on remote workers continues in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Some two-thirds of remote workers now use work devices for personal tasks and use personal home devices for business activities. As a result, attackers have been actively probing remote workers. Acronis observed more than twice the number of global cyberattacks, with a 300% increase in brute-force attacks against remote machines via RDP.