Which Security Trends We Should Keep an Eye on In 2021 | Free Antivirus Software

2020 was the high season for cybercriminals. Will that continue in 2021? Or can the rudder be turned? And if so, how? An outlook on developments in the area of ​​ cybersecurity.

2020 was one of the most demanding years for cybersecurity teams worldwide. It brought about fundamental changes, the effects of which will occupy companies and organizations for a long time. The reason lies less in the cyber risks themselves. The nature of the attacks and the speed with which they are used for certain purposes have a much more serious impact. What can we expect in 2021?

Cyberattacks Follow an Economic Logic

For years, financial institutions have been the number one target of cyberattacks. In the meantime, the focus is increasingly on medium-sized companies. The reason is a simple cost/benefit analysis. In recent years, the financial industry has learned to deal with complex cyber attacks. The chances of making money with it have dropped significantly. The effort and the risk have increased. Careless companies are easier victims, especially if their business is crucially dependent on a functioning IT. Educational institutions and operators of critical infrastructures, above all the healthcare system, were more frequently at the center of targeted attacks in 2020. In the past year, many companies and educational institutes were forced to switch to digital work and home office very quickly.

Well-Known Risks Remain

Blackmail campaigns, DDoS attacks, and “carpet bombing” attacks will remain just as present in 2021 as the tried and tested rip-offs on smartphones using fleece is apps. The hackers will go on a phishing tour again this year. And attacks on SaaS applications and cloud services will not stop either but will increase. Because the switch to the home office and the transformation to the cloud opens up new opportunities for criminals. IT security teams must also prepare for the developments described below.

Double Extortion: The Evolution of Ransomware

Ransomware continues to be one of the greatest external cyber risks for almost all companies and public organizations. Nevertheless, the pandemic has shown how quickly cybercriminals can use specific situations and general uncertainty for their own purposes. The attacks on the health system give a hint of what might be in store for us here. Another new trend is the so-called "double extortion": So far, ransomware has only been used to encrypt the data of the attacked company and to demand a ransom for its decryption. Today most ransomware attacks operate in two stages:

·         In a first step, the networks are searched for possible sensitive data and these are stolen unnoticed.
·         The encryption is then started.

The victims are blackmailed twice:

·         Once to affect the decryption of the data.
·         A second time to obtain the non-disclosure of the stolen data.

But this development also has something positive: Companies that carefully monitor their environment have a good chance of discovering such double extortion attacks at an early stage.

Cyber ​​attacks and Data Protection as Political Weapons

So-called state-sponsored attacks are nothing new in and of themselves. Nations have used cyberattacks for espionage or sabotage for more than 20 years. The history of these attacks shows, however, that this means is increasingly being used strategically by all those involved. The so-called SolarWind Supply Chain Attack in the USA sparked a discussion about whether such an attack should already be viewed as an act of war by a hostile nation. The fact that the USA has used these methods several times in the past does not seem to play a major role and shows the potential danger of this development.

Data Protection as A Means of Political Maneuvers

The topic of data protection and privacy is now also used as a political weapon. With the judgment of July 17, 2020, on the Privacy Shield, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) declared a data protection agreement with the USA to be invalid for the second time. Although the ECJ ruling is not directly binding on Switzerland, it has significant effects on many Swiss companies. The years of struggle for data protection show that different worldviews clash here. For years the question has focused on the relationship between the EU / USA and Switzerland / USA. But that distracts from the fact that there are still several unsolved cases. Let's think of Russia, India, China, and other popular IT near and offshore centers.

Political Influence

Also, politicians have meanwhile discovered digitization for themselves, and not only in a positive sense: Even with the ongoing conflicts around Huawei and Tik-Tok, it is obvious that powerful interests are likely to be at play to a large extent. It is, therefore, to be feared that data protection will also degenerate into a political weapon in the struggle for technological supremacy. For many companies in Switzerland, especially in difficult times, this is not good news. Those who want to avoid the uncertain political situation and the increasing complexity already rely on purely European or Swiss providers when selecting their services. In fact, large US providers have also started to react to the legal problem and offer customers today or shortly the possibility of processing their data exclusively on European (increasingly also Swiss) servers. Despite the efforts of these companies, they will have to prove that they can really enforce a legal separation.

Deepfakes: Nothing Is What It Seems.

But not everything stays the same. Something new is emerging on the threat horizon: deepfake. The manipulation of image and sound with the help of artificial intelligence is understood as deep fakes. Deepfakes were developed by the film industry and have been used in films such as StarWars to portray characters from previous episodes in a lifelike manner. Deepfake examples from last year are here to find. But deepfakes are also useful for faking video recordings or mimicking a person's voice. This also opens up new opportunities for cybercrime for fraud, the manipulation of stock market prices, or political disinformation. So far, no large-scale deepfake attacks have become known. However, it is only a matter of time. As a precaution, a new term for it was coined with voice phishing, at least in security circles.

Will 2021 Be the Turning Point?

Despite all the negative developments, there is also good news. The authorities have made great strides in global cooperation in the fight against cybercrime. They have been able to announce some spectacular successes in the last few months. Europol, for example, reported the shutdown of the VPN service Safe-Inet and the seizure of IT infrastructure in Germany, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the USA on December 22, 2020. According to the authorities, Safe-It has been used by some of the world's biggest cybercriminals for phishing attacks, blackmail attempts with ransomware, and web skimming (interception of payment information). Europol speaks of the "cybercriminals favorite VPN". Participated in the globally coordinated action under the name "Operation Nova"

Money Mules Uncovered

Indeed, Operation Nova was by no means the only successful campaign against organized cybercrime. At the beginning of December, more than 4,000 money mules were identified in a globally coordinated campaign and over 400 arrests were made in this context. Money mules are platforms that allow perpetrators to disguise the flow of payments, for example in the case of ransomware attacks, and are one of the most important elements in these attacks. At the end of November, large-scale fraud involving stolen credit card information and damage of EUR 40 million was prevented.

Everyone Has to Do Their Security Homework.

The global potential and the relatively low risk are the main factors that make cybercrime so attractive. The authorities have massively increased their resources in recent years and have learned to cooperate effectively and efficiently. Great progress can still be expected here. The risk for the perpetrator increases. However, that alone will not be enough. The prey is too tempting. But if companies and institutions do their security homework at the same time, hopefully, things can be turned around.

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