Ransomware focus heads south
Source: Middle East Insurance Review | May 2023
The frequency and size of ransomware attacks has started to spread from organisations primarily based in developed economies in the northern hemisphere, to include more targets in the southern hemisphere including the Middle East, Asia, Australia, as well as South America, according to the specialist insurer Hiscox.
In a blog on the insurer’s website, the company’s cyber education and advisory professional Eddie Lamb said, “The shift in focus ranges from the displacement of criminal activity caused by Russian president Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine to a perceived greater vulnerability of businesses in the southern hemisphere with less mature cyber defences.
“In addition, there is the evolution of ‘ransomware as a service’ subscription-based malware models serving Russian-speaking gangs only, to the introduction of more varied language options.”
Writing in the blog, Hiscox senior cyber underwriter Tim Andrews said, “The focus must be on both multi-nationals with operations in the southern hemisphere region as well as companies domiciled in those regions to tighten up their approach to the ransomware threat.”
A global record of reported ransomware attacks maintained by cyber security information provider Comparitech revealed that back in 2018, ransomware was mainly a northern hemisphere problem. But by 2022, the number of attacks in the southern hemisphere had begun to proliferate, particularly in South America, as well as Africa, across the Middle East, East and Southeast Asia and is likely to be worse than reported.
Further evidence that ransomware attacks – though by no means eradicated in the northern hemisphere – are increasingly a problem in the southern hemisphere - is provided by analysing trends on the darknet. M