Malwarebytes, an American security firm announced the findings of its annual ‘State of Malware’ report, this report explored the working methodology of employees and cybercriminals. Work from home was the new normal during the Covid-19 pandemic wherein many companies altered their working methodology and started working remotely.
The notable change was in the working methodology of the threat actors, they were more focused on gathering intelligence, and exploiting and preying upon fears with targeted and sophisticated assaults. Last year, threat actors targeted many high-profile firms and popular personalities which included hacking the accounts of famous personalities such as Barack Obama, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk; attacking FireEye and SolarWinds via supply chain and the Marriott hotel which recorded theft of the records of 5.2 million guests.
Marcin Kleczynski, CEO of Malwarebytes stated, “this past year has taught us that cybercriminals are increasingly formidable, planning long-term, strategic, and focused attacks that are sometimes years in the making. 2020 continued to show us that no company is immune, and there is no such thing as ‘safe enough’.”
“The COVID-19 pandemic compounded this with new challenges in securing remote workforces, making it essential that we quickly become more adaptable and learn how to better protect workers in any environment. While our total detections are down this year, we must remain vigilant. The threats we are seeing are more refined and damaging than ever before”, he further added.
Last year, Malwarebytes observed an overall drop of 24 percent of Windows detections across businesses and an 11 percent drop for clients. In total, there was a 12 percent drop in Windows detections across the board. However, Mac detections for businesses surged to 31 percent, 2020 also witnessed the growth of Android malware called FakeAdsBlock, which produced an alarming number of non-stop ads, accounting for 80,654 detections.
HiddenAds was discovered to be the most common mobile adware application, this trojan attacks users with ads, and nearly 704,418 malicious activities were reported with an increase of nearly 150 percent year-over-year.
