When discussing national security threats in the digital landscape, attention often shifts to suspected state-backed hackers, such as those affiliated with China targeting the U.S. Treasury or Russian ransomware groups claiming to hold sensitive FBI data. However, a recent report from the Google Threat Intelligence Group highlights that financially motivated cybercrime, even when unlinked to state actors, can pose equally severe risks to national security.
“A single incident can be impactful enough on its own to have a severe consequence on the victim and disrupt citizens' access to critical goods and services,” Google warns, emphasizing the need to categorize cybercrime as a national security priority requiring global cooperation.
Despite cybercriminal activity comprising the vast majority of malicious online behavior, national security experts predominantly focus on state-sponsored hacking groups, according to the February 12 Google Threat Intelligence Group report. While state-backed attacks undoubtedly pose a critical threat, Google argues that cybercrime and state-sponsored cyber warfare cannot be evaluated in isolation.
“A hospital disrupted by a state-backed group using a wiper and a hospital disrupted by a financially motivated group using ransomware have the same impact on patient care,” Google analysts assert. “Likewise, sensitive data stolen from an organization and posted on a data leak site can be exploited by an adversary in the same way data exfiltrated in an espionage operation can be.”
The escalation of cyberattacks on healthcare providers underscores the severity of this threat. Millions of patient records have been stolen, and even blood donor supply chains have been affected. “Healthcare's share of posts on data leak sites has doubled over the past three years,” Google notes, “even as the number of data leak sites tracked by Google Threat Intelligence Group has increased by nearly 50% year over year.”
The report highlights how Russia has integrated cybercriminal capabilities into warfare, citing the military intelligence-linked Sandworm unit (APT44), which leverages cybercrime-sourced malware for espionage and disruption in Ukraine. Iran-based threat actors similarly deploy ransomware to generate revenue while conducting espionage. Chinese spy groups supplement their operations with cybercrime, and North Korean state-backed hackers engage in cyber theft to fund the regime. “North Korea has heavily targeted cryptocurrencies, compromising exchanges and individual victims’ crypto wallets,” Google states.
These findings illustrate how nation-states increasingly procure cyber capabilities through criminal networks, leveraging cybercrime to facilitate espionage, data theft, and financial gain. Addressing this challenge requires acknowledging cybercrime as a fundamental national security issue.
“Cybercrime involves collaboration between disparate groups often across borders and without respect to sovereignty,” Google explains. Therefore, any solution must involve international cooperation between law enforcement and intelligence agencies to track, arrest, and prosecute cybercriminals effectively.
