Each year security industry predicts what the biggest threats could be and create stronger defense and to fight with these threats. For this they use what they have learned from previous year’s attack. Last year wasn’t great in respect to cyber security. The level of cyberattacks reached to a level that no one could’ve predicted.
WannaCry, NotPetya, Locky are few examples that created news headlines as hackers could access data of many big organizations and cost them billions of dollars. Every year we plan different strategies to fight with such attacks but we all know a secure future can only be achieved if we are able to prevent cybercrimes from becoming bolder and bigger. If you think what you saw last year was bad then this year won’t be any better. Things will be worse as hackers are using technology with behavioral insights to target individuals.
Earlier becoming a cybercriminal was difficult but now it has become easier. One doesn’t need to have any specific technical knowledge – just by using the right tools he can become a successful cybercriminal.
Also Read : Non-Financial Data That You Should Secure
This all raise a question in our minds what will be this year be like? To answer this, you need to read the article and see the future predictions.
1. Crypto jacking
With the exploding popularity of cryptocurrency, cybercriminals have become interested in developing ways to earn cryptocurrency. For this they have started using CPU power to mine cryptocurrency.
Crypto jacking means secretly using a computing device to mine cryptocurrency, it can be done without installing a software on victim’s machine.
Most of us don’t consider this as a threat, as for them till the time they are able to access their system it is okay. Even if it means using a slow and sluggish machine. But they don’t understand hackers can “mine” their wallet with crypto jacking. Besides this cybercriminal can also use the technique to replace advertising and crate a means to earn revenue.
2. AI powered attacks
AI powered machines can learn from past events and our instructions. This helps to stay secure and predict upcoming threats. But AI may prove as a double-edged sword as hackers can use it to launch sophisticated and advanced attacks.
The information that AI has can be used to gather information about an organization or individual. Plus, AI can also help hackers to crack password by narrowing down the number of probable passwords and by suggesting what one can use it based on his behavioral patterns.
3. Sandbox Escaping Attacks
Sandboxing is the gift of technological advancement, it helps to stay protected from malware attacks. But cyber criminals are smart they are finding out ways to bypass this technology. They are developing such threats that are able to detect if they are inside a sandbox, when they are there they become inactive and once they are outside malicious code is executed.
4. Companies failing to comply with GDPR
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which will come into effect on May 25th, 2018 offers number of measures to protect data. It includes – increased regional scope, stricter laws for user consent and more. Fines will be imposed on companies that will fail to abide by these rules.
But at per reports many companies will fail or the other way around they will choose not to comply as they claim the cost of compliance overshadows the risks.
5. Ransomware in the cloud
A sudden increase in ransomware attacks has been noticed, because it is simple and bad guys can easily earn money by locking down an individual out of his machine. Hackers have started creating more ransomware attacks as they understand importance of data and know people usually fail to back up their data. Due to which they can easily get money by locking their data.
But they also know after the recent WannaCry attack big and small companies have started using cloud service to back up their data. And that is the reason they are now targeting it too and smaller organization those who fail to take proper measures to secure their backed-up data are at risk.
Must read : How Safe Is Your Android Phone For A Digital Transaction?
This all clearly states; this year won’t be better than the last year. We will see more sophisticated attacks and the only way to stay secure is by not repeating the mistakes. The predictions made by security researchers that we have discussed above will helps us to design plans to guard our data. But this all can only be possible if understand the risk involved, if we are ignorant about the threats then nothing can be done.
We need to think one step ahead of cyber criminals in order to stay protected and should not ignore the security warnings.
Leave a Reply