Cybersecurity: The risks are growing
September 25, 2018
Cyberattacks are increasing, both in frequency and disruptive potential. Companies are dealing with attacks on numerous fronts from phishing to malware and even identity theft.
Cybersecurity risks are growing, both in their prevalence and in their disruptive potential. Attacks against businesses have almost doubled in five years, and incidents that would once have been considered extraordinary are becoming more and more commonplace.
The financial impact of cybersecurity breaches is rising, and some of the largest costs in 2017 related to ransomware attacks, which accounted for 64 percent of all malicious emails. Notable examples included the WannaCry attack, which affected 300,000 computers across 150 countries, and NotPetya, which caused quarterly losses of million for a number of affected businesses.
Another growing trend is the use of cyberattacks to target critical infrastructure and strategic industrial sectors, raising fears that, in a worst-case scenario, attackers could trigger a breakdown in the systems that keep societies functioning.
Excerpt from the Global Risks Report 2018.