Record-breaking ransoms and breaches: A timeline of ransomware in 2024


It was another record-breaking year for ransomware. When file-locking malware wasn’t causing widespread disruption, like downing online services and lasting outages, ransomware was the cause of unprecedented data theft attacks affecting hundreds of millions of people, in some cases for life.

While governments have struck some rare wins against ransomware hackers over the past 12 months, including the disruption of the prolific LockBit gang and the seizure and takedown of Radar, these data theft and extortion attacks continue to increase dramatically, both in terms of frequency and sophistication.

Read more…
Source: TechCrunch


Sign up for our Newsletter


Related:

  • vSphere and BRICKSTORM Malware: A Defender’s Guide

    April 2, 2026

    Building on recent BRICKSTORM research from Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG), this post explores the evolving threats facing virtualized environments. These operations directly target the VMware vSphere ecosystem, specifically the vCenter Server Appliance (VCSA) and ESXi hypervisors. To help organizations stay ahead of these risks, we will focus on the essential hardening strategies and mitigating controls ...

  • UK manufacturers under cyber fire with 80% reporting attacks

    April 1, 2026

    Nearly 80 percent of British manufacturers say they’ve been hit by a cyber incident in the past year, as new research suggests disruption on the factory floor is no longer an exception but business as usual. According to security outfit ESET, 78 percent of UK manufacturers admit to suffering at least one cyber incident in the ...

  • A laughing RAT: CrystalX combines spyware, stealer, and prankware features

    April 1, 2026

    In March 2026, Kaspersky researchers discovered an active campaign promoting previously unknown malware in private Telegram chats. The Trojan was offered as a MaaS (malware‑as‑a‑service) with three subscription tiers. It caught the researchers attention because of its extensive arsenal of capabilities. On the panel provided to third‑party actors, in addition to the standard features of RAT‑like malware, ...

  • Iran targets M365 accounts with password-spraying attacks

    March 31, 2026

    Suspected Iran-linked threat actors are conducting password-spraying attacks against hundreds of organizations, primarily Middle Eastern municipalities, in campaigns that security researchers believe may have been aimed at supporting bomb-damage assessment following missile strikes. Tel Aviv-based Check Point Research on Tuesday said that the attackers used multiple source IP addresses to target numerous Microsoft 365 accounts, affecting ...

  • North Korea-Nexus Threat Actor Compromises Widely Used Axios NPM Package in Supply Chain Attack

    March 31, 2026

    Google Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) is tracking an active software supply chain attack targeting the popular Node Package Manager (NPM) package “axios.” Between March 31, 2026, 00:21 and 03:20 UTC, an attacker introduced a malicious dependency named “plain-crypto-js” into axios NPM releases versions 1.14.1 and 0.30.4. Axios is the most popular JavaScript library used to simplify ...

  • GitHub developers targeted by fake VS Code alerts spreading malware

    March 30, 2026

    Cybercriminals are tricking GitHub into sending out fraudulent email notifications, luring software developers into downloading malware, experts have warned. Security researchers Socket, who said they observed a large-scale, coordinated spam campaign targeting developers on various projects. GitHub has a section called “Discussions”, which is essentially a forum for discussing various projects. When a developer participates in, ...