.........end to Advanced Persistent Threat
KasperskyLab’s
experts have revealed their predictions for 2016, which are based on
the expertise of the Global Research and Analysis Team - the company’s
43 top security experts, located all over the world. Each member
contributed unique expertise and, in 2015 alone, their insight and
intelligence resulted in detailed reports on 12 Advanced Persistent
Threat actors (APTs), “speaking” different languages, including French,
Arabic, Chinese, Russian, English, among others.
Kaspersky Lab’s
experts anticipate that in 2016 we will see significant evolution in
cyberespionage tradecraft. First, there will be a dramatic change in how
APTs are structured and operated. It is expected to see a decreased
emphasis on ‘persistence’, with a greater focus on memory-resident or
fileless malware, reducing the traces left on an infected system and
thereby avoiding detection.
Furthermore,
the experts see that there is less urge to demonstrate superior
cyber-skills, so return on investment will rule much of the nation-state
attacker’s decision-making. Therefore there will be an increase in the
repurposing of off-the-shelf malware rather than investment in bootkits,
rootkits and custom malware that gets burned by research teams.
In
a more long-term perspective, there is an expectation that more
newcomers will enter the APT space. Cyber-mercenaries will grow in
number as more parties seek to gain from online attacks. These are
expected to offer attack expertise to anyone willing to pay, and also to
sell to interested third-parties digital access to high-profile
victims, in what could be called an ‘Access-as-a-Service’ offering.
Consumer
threats will also evolve. According to experts ransomware will be
gaining more ground on banking Trojans and is expected to extend into
new areas such as OS X devices, often owned by wealthier and therefore
more lucrative targets in addition to mobile and the Internet-of-Things.
Cybercriminals
are constantly looking for new ways to make their victims pay.
Therefore, alternative payment systems such as ApplePay and AndroidPay,
as well as stock exchanges are expected to become growing targets for
financial cyber-attacks.
In
2015, Kasperksy Lab experts witnessed a rise in the number of DOXing,
public shaming and extortion attacks, as everyone from Hactivists to
nation-states embraced the strategic dumping of private pictures,
information, customer lists, and code to shame their targets. Sadly, Kaspersky Lab expects this practice to continue to rise exponentially in 2016.
“Nigeria ranks number 8 for Internet Users by country*,
it is the highest number among all African countries. It is obvious
that in this region we will see many attacks on users aimed at getting
their financial and personal data on mobiles and PCs. Ransomware will
also likely rise in this region in 2016. Also there are more and more
companies choosing to keep their data in the cloud due to the reduced
costs and the grown Internet speed, so the opportunity for malware
writers to steal company data has become a much bigger risk than a few
years ago” says Dirk Kollberg, Senior Security Researcher, Global
Research & Analysis Team at Kaspersky Lab.
In
order to be able to minimise the future risks connected with
cyber-attacks of the future, businesses should create and deploy a
complete security strategy. It is important to educate staff about
cybersecurity, implement multi-layered Endpoint protection with extra
proactive layers and protect all elements of infrastructure, patch
vulnerabilities, mind everything that is mobile and implement encryption
for communication
and sensitive data. Companies that have high risks of encountering
cyberattacks should consider creating a dedicated Security Operations
Center.
Individuals
should invest in a robust security solution for all devices and switch
to encrypted communication. However, they should not solely rely on
technology. Studying the basics of cybersecurity and exploring options
that come with the protective solution can save from many incidents.
With more and more of our lives being exposed online – it might be
useful to revise online habits, as once the information is uploaded it
stays online forever and can be used against you or your company.
Source: African Press Organization
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