Barracuda researchers discovered that the education (15%), municipality (12%), healthcare (12%), infrastructure (8%), and financial (6%) sectors are the five most targeted by adversaries after identifying and analyzing 106 highly publicized ransomware attacks over the past year. According to the analysis, ransomware attacks on educational institutions more than doubled from the previous year, while attacks on the healthcare and financial sectors tripled, and infrastructure-related attacks quadrupled.
“As ransomware and other cyber threats continue to evolve, the need for adequate security solutions has never been greater,” said Fleming Shi, CTO at Barracuda. “Many cybercriminals target small businesses in an attempt to gain access to larger organizations. As a result, it is essential for security providers to create products that are easy to use and implement, regardless of a company’s size. Additionally, sophisticated security technologies should be available as services, so that businesses of all sizes can protect themselves against these ever-changing threats. By making security solutions more accessible and user-friendly, the entire industry can help to better defend against ransomware and other cyberattacks.”
The researchers observed an increase in the number of service providers – companies that provide IT or other business services – affected by ransomware in the previous year. However, public data indicates that fewer victims paid the ransom, most likely due to improved defenses, particularly in critical infrastructure.
According to Barracuda’s own detections, the volume of ransomware threats peaked at 1.2 million per month between January and June 2022.
According to the company, most ransomware attacks do not make headlines because many victims choose not to disclose when they are attacked, and the attacks are frequently sophisticated and extremely difficult to handle for small businesses.
