Turns out the fastest way to get a company to consider paying a ransom isn’t calling the CEO – it’s targeting the 46-year-old IT manager.
That’s according to Zscaler, whose ThreatLabz researchers tracked 351 victims across 334 organizations caught up in a single ransomware campaign over the course of a month.
The data suggests today’s ransomware crews have become oddly specific about their preferred victim profile: nearly two-thirds of victims held manager-level titles or above, the average victim was a 46-year-old Gen Xer, and three-quarters worked in accounting and finance, sales, operations, HR, or marketing. Half worked in the industrial or IT sectors.
Read more…
Source: The Register News
Sign up for the Cyber Security Review Newsletter
The latest cyber security news and insights delivered right to your inbox
Related:
- Earth Preta’s Cyberespionage Campaign Hits Over 200
March 27, 2023
Through extensive analysis and as of this writing, we discovered over 200 victims, leading to a wider intelligence analysis of the groups’ goals, different operation groups, and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs). Our study aimed at understanding the different phases and facets involved in this operation, shedding light on the motives and techniques used by ...
- How scammers employ IPFS for email phishing
March 27, 2023
The idea of creating Web 3.0 has been around since the end of 2000s. The new version of the world wide web should repair the weak points of Web 2.0., some of which are: featureless content, prevalence of proprietary solutions, and lack of safety in a centralized user data storage environment, where a massive leak ...
- Emotet malware distributed as fake W-9 tax forms from the IRS
March 26, 2023
A new Emotet phishing campaign is targeting U.S. taxpayers by impersonating W-9 tax forms allegedly sent by the Internal Revenue Service and companies you work with. Emotet is a notorious malware infection distributed through phishing emails that in the past contained Microsoft Word and Excel documents with malicious macros that install the malware. Read more… Source: Bleeping Computer
- Business Email Compromise Tactics Used to Facilitate the Acquisition of Commodities and Defrauding Vendors
March 24, 2023
The FBI warns the public of criminal actors using Business Email Compromise (BEC) schemes to facilitate the acquisition of a wide range of commodities. BEC is one of the most financially damaging online crimes. It exploits the fact that so many of us rely on email to conduct business—both personal and professional. In many BEC scams, ...
- Uncle Sam reveals it sent cyber-soldiers to Albania to hunt for Iranian threats
March 24, 2023
US Cyber Command operators have confirmed they carried out an online defensive mission in Albania, in response to last year’s cyber attacks against the local government. Over the course of the three-month deployment, Cyber National Mission Force (CNMF) troops worked with their Albanian counterparts to hunt for cyber threats and identify vulnerabilities on networks in the ...
- CISA Releases Six Industrial Control Systems Advisories
March 23, 2023
CISA released six Industrial Control Systems (ICS) advisories on March 23, 2023. These advisories provide timely information about current security issues, vulnerabilities, and exploits surrounding ICS. ICSA-23-082-01 RoboDK ICSA-23-082-02 CP-Plus KVMS Pro ICSA-23-082-03 SAUTER EY-modulo 5 Building Automation Stations Read more… Source: U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Related story: CISA Releases Eight Industrial Control Systems Advisories