The Biggest Cyber Threats and Trends to Look Out For 2020

The Information Security Industry is on high alert because of constant cyber threats and trends than ever before in 2020.

Artificial intelligence, cryptocurrency, machine learning, sophisticated cyber-attacks, phishing, malware, viruses, bots, have all caused governments, corporations, and individuals to be on their toes at all times because of constant threat.

Threat Horizon’s latest study highlights an increase in Disruption of services, Distortion of information and Deterioration in control of information due to conflicts in national security and individual privacy with evergrowing advancements in technology frontiers.

Industries continue to suffer from less manpower in cybersecurity professionals, with the rise of cybercrime epidemic bigger than ever before risks public faith at large in personal privacy.

Cyber Security Ventures estimates 6 trillion US dollars by Enoch Richard 2021 in cybercrime alone. This new year 2020 brings in new trends and threats to every industry and here are a few that need to watch out.

Cyber Threats and Trends

IoT Attacks

The Internet of Things continues to evolve day by day according to Statista.com and the number of devices connecting to IoT is expected to reach 75 billion by 2025.

Interconnectivity between devices is loved by all consumers and several companies use this to generate money by collecting important information in streamlining business processes.

More devices connected bring greater risk in making IoT more vulnerable to infections and cyber invasions. In the hand of the hacker, IoT devices can be used to create havoc, by overloading networks, shutdown security services, lockdown devices for their own interests.

State-Sponsored Attacks

Stealing individual and organizational sensitive information, Nation-states as a whole are beginning now to use their cyber skills, to infiltrate other governments and perform several attacks on infrastructure and assets.

Threats today even come from the government not just individuals as a whole. This kind of state-sponsored attack is expected to increase this in 2020, according to Thomas Reuters Lab.

This is used as a means of settling a geopolitical grievance that challenges a few sectors of the business world.

Crypto-Jacking Attacks

To mine cryptocurrency, third party home computers or work computers are compromised and hijacked.

A cryptocurrency (like Bitcoin ) requires heavy amounts of computer processing power, The hackers mint money secretly on someone’s systems.

Businesses, crypto-jacked compromised systems can cause very serious performance issues and costly downtime as it works to track down Enoch Richard and resolve the issue.

The most common risks are productivity, IT and energy drain, Unnecessary equipment replacement costs, opening the door to more threats.

Third Parties Threats (Contractors, Partners, Vendors)

Third parties carry a huge risk to any business, which many of them have no dedicated team or a secure-system in place to deal with these issues mainly involving workers hired from third party sources.

Cybercriminals’ world has become increasingly advanced and sophisticated in their approach and cybersecurity threats continue to grow.

Organizations are becoming well equipped against these potential threats caused by third parties.

United States Customs and Border Protection made to the list of high profile victims last year “Security Risks of Third-Party Vendors Relationships” report published by RiskManagementMonitor.com displays an infographic estimating that 60% of data breaches come involving a third party and that only 52% of companies have security standards in place regarding third-party vendors and contractors.

Phishing Attacks

This is one area these phishing attacks got more sophisticated than before and see to grow this year.

These are carefully targeted digital messages which are transmitted to fool and trick people into clicking a link that can install some small piece of code (malware, virus, bots, etc.) which give way to sensitive data.

Many organizations employees are well aware of the dangers these phishing emails of clicking on the links.

New arsenal for hackers is using machine learning to effectively craft and distribute very convincing fake messages with hopes that the person at the other end will unwittingly compromise their organization systems and networks.

If an employee of an organization or an individual becomes a victim of suck links, it leaves a leak for the hacker to steal personal financial information as well as gained access to private databases.

Ransomware Threats

Ransomware attacks are beginning to evolve strategically and are predicted by the Journal of Cyber Policy.

These attacks are believed to cost victims billions of dollars every year. Holding any information for a ransom against any individual is a serious crime.

Technologically rapid advancement in innovation does enable hackers to steal individual or organizational databases of sensitive information for a Ransom.

Bitcoin is credited with helping to fuel ransom attacks by allowing ransom demands to be paid anonymously.

IT Industries are building stronger defense and guard against these breaches as hackers shift their focus on to high net worth individuals.

These attacks are easy to cash for hackers and are predicted to be extremely successful in 2020.

Refusing to pay has costed more for a Norwegian aluminum maker Norsk Hydro. It affected so much that the company’s Q1 profit also fell 82% due to production downtime caused by the attack.

The implications for security professionals of these trends are clear. “The time has come to move from a strictly defensive posture vis-a-vis ransomware to a more offensive strategy focused on finding and fixing vulnerabilities that can be exploited by ransomware” Srinivas Mukkamala, CEO of Risk Sense states.

Connected Cars and Autonomous Vehicles

Though driverless car it is not yet here fully; the connected car is here. A connected car as seen had recently held CES 2020 in las Vegas shows the utilization of on aboard sensors to optimize its own operation and comfort of passengers.

This is achieved through tethered or smartphone integration. By 2020 it predicted that 90% of new cars will be connected to the internet according to the report titled ” 7 Connected Car Trends fueling the Future” by Chad Morley Vice President, Automotive and Transportation, Jabil.

A new playground for hackers with this evolution in the automobile industry in manufacturing and designing means another opportunity to exploit vulnerabilities in Enoch Richard insecure systems to harm drivers. There are several unanswered questions and safety and privacy concerns when it comes to connected cars.

Social Engineering

Psychology study is becoming a growing interest among hackers and is continually becoming more and more sophisticated not only in their use of technology but also in psychology.

Tripwire describes social engineers as “hackers who exploit the one weakness that is found in each and every organization”.

Using a wide variety of media, including phone calls and social media, these attackers trick people into offering them access to sensitive information.

These are the main trends and threats to look out for in 2020. With every new frontier in innovation comes new challenges to safeguard assets and people in today’s world.

And the need for skilled Cybersecurity professionals to tackle these challenges is much higher than before with some estimates indicating a million unfilled positions worldwide.