- May 4, 2019
- 831
Unsurprisingly, cyber attacks are growing in the business sector and not just in the United States but world-wide. Cyber-attacks represent the greatest risk in six out of ten of the top economies in the world. The report presented by the World Economic Forum discusses formjacking, cryptojacking, ransomware like LockerGoga and other cyber-attacks of which CEOs around the globe are starting to become more aware.
These different types of attacks break out as malicious code designed to steal monetary or physical assets from consumers and businesses. They’re also becoming more serious as time passes by. As such, they cost companies around 12% more in damages in 2018 than in 2017. This should force executives to pay more attention to technical experts on staff during board meetings.
That is actually part of the problem. According to this report, India is the only country listed in the top seven global economies that has dropped cyber-attacks off of their top five risks. However, given the major cyber-attack involving Wipro early in 2019, it is safe to expect that cyberattacks will be back in the top five in 2020. What is particularly troubling is that the attack went unreported for months and that the tools and techniques used by the malicious actors consisted of reused tools from 2015 and 2017 attacks. A phishing attack laid the groundwork for bad actors to establish a foothold. These attackers then took control of internal systems and used open-source tools to build upon and sustain their access.
Brian Krebs, the original reporter who broke this story, said that the attackers did not limit the attack to Wipro but also set their sights on other companies including Sears, Green Dot, Elavon, Rackspace, Avanade, PCM and CapGemini. Based on the victims of the attacker groups, companies that favored third party organizations for services were common targets.

Cyber Attack Risk Climbs in Latest WEF Regional Risk Report
Cyber-attacks represent the greatest risk in six out of ten of the top economies in the world. Risks include formjacking, cryptojacking and ransomware.