{"id":46237,"date":"2022-04-18T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-18T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"urn:uuid:c7664787-f71a-53fd-2906-2dcf2b8dd10b"},"modified":"2022-04-18T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2022-04-18T00:00:00","slug":"cyber-risk-index-2h-2021-an-assessment-for-security-leaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.threatshub.org\/blog\/cyber-risk-index-2h-2021-an-assessment-for-security-leaders\/","title":{"rendered":"Cyber Risk Index (2H\u2019 2021): An Assessment for Security Leaders"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Let\u2019s dig into the results a bit further to identify areas of greatest concern across regions.<\/p>\n

1. Top five security risks
<\/i>With the global Covid-19 pandemic continuing as well as many successful ransomware attacks and breaches occurring, it does appear that many organizations felt some areas of their preparedness may be more of a concern now than in the past. Below are the top five security risks around their infrastructure:<\/p>\n

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  1. Mobile\/remote employees<\/li>\n
  2. Cloud computing infrastructure and providers<\/li>\n
  3. Across 3rd party applications<\/li>\n
  4. Malicious insiders<\/li>\n
  5. Mobile devices such as smart phones<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The pandemic brought a major shift from working in office to working from home (WFH), and many organizations had to quickly figure out how to secure these employees.  As seen above, this is the biggest concern from respondents and will likely continue.  Similarly, businesses showed concerns about mobile devices which are being used more by employees to conduct business remotely. <\/p>\n

    We also saw an acceleration with cloud implementations during the pandemic and as such it\u2019s not surprising this area of the infrastructure is of major concern.  Both WFH and cloud implementations also mean a higher reliance on third-party applications being utilized, and respondents recognize this as a threat.  Lastly, malicious insiders are a staple in this list and is one of the hardest areas to protect against for organizations.<\/p>\n

    2. Lack of preparation
    <\/i>Globally, respondents indicated the lowest number for preparedness out of all 31 questions in this area: My organization\u2019s IT security function supports security in the DevOps environment.<\/i>  As more organizations shift left to the cloud in support of rapid code development, it has become an area of real concern for securing this environment within an organization.<\/p>\n

    3. Successful cyberattacks seem imminent
    <\/i>When asked about attacks in the past 12 months and future attacks for next year, the results don\u2019t bode well for 2022. Globally, 84% experienced one or more successful attack, and 35% had seven or more successful attacks in the past 12 months. Additionally, 76% say it is somewhat to very likely they will have a successful attack in the next 12 months. Even though this was a 10% drop from the first half, this again appears to indicate organizations know they are not prepared enough to defend against new attacks. <\/p>\n

    Top global threats<\/span><\/p>\n

    The CRI is designed to help organizations understand where their highest risks lie and identify areas where they can improve their preparedness. We cannot change what the attackers will do in the future, but the CTI will continue to help us understand if attackers are being more aggressive.  From the 1H\u20192021 to 2H\u20192021, the top threats globally are:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Ransomware<\/li>\n
    2. Phishing and social engineering<\/li>\n
    3. Denial of service (DoS)<\/li>\n
    4. Botnets<\/li>\n
    5. Man-in-the-middle attack (MitM)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Ransomware was and will continue to be a major concern for everyone, so it is unsurprising this threat landed at number one.  Phishing and social engineering is used in most attacks, mainly for the initial access into a network.  One interesting threat is DoS, as we\u2019re seeing some ransomware-as-a-service<\/a> groups employ this in a multiple extortion attack.  MitM attacks may be rising due to the perception that supply chain attacks (a form of MitM) are increasing.<\/p>\n

      Improving your cyber risk<\/span><\/p>\n

      The good news from the 2H\u20192021 CRI is that we are seeing organizations starting to understand that they need to improve their cyber risk, which is done through a process of improving their people, process, and technology (PPT) within their business. Since the CRI looks at all three of these areas, an improvement to the total CRI could be due to any one, or all, of these categories. <\/p>\n

      Based on the results, these are the areas of preparedness that need the most work to address the perceived areas of highest risk:<\/p>\n