India highest attacked country by hackers in Asia, 2nd globally in 2022

India was the highest attacked country by hackers in Asia and the second-most attacked country globally (after the US) in 2022, a report showed on Wednesday.

The number of cyber attacks on India increased by 24.3 per cent last year.

Asia-Pacific remained the most targeted region globally, receiving 20.4 per cent of all attacks in 2021 and 24.1 per cent of all attacks in 2022.

The number of attacks targeting the Asia-Pacific region increased by 26.4 per cent, according to data from cyber-security firm CloudSEK.

North America, Asia-Pacific and Europe remained the most targeted regions in both the years 2021 and 2022.

However, North America witnessed a decline in targeted attacks but remained the third most targeted region in 2022 (down from second in 2021), while Europe rose to the second position, possibly due to the Russia-Ukraine war.

"2022 observed an increase in cybercrime with a surge in sophisticated and targeted cyber attacks. This can be attributed to an increase in underground activity leading to a rise in utility of malicious tools and malware," said a security researcher from CloudSEK TRIAD team.

Emergence of numerous new ransomware groups and persistence of the old ones lead to an exponential increase in ransomware attacks.

"Sectors like electric vehicles grabbed the attention of threat actors owing to the new technologies plagued with various vulnerabilities," said the researcher.

Ransomware attacks increased drastically, going from the least common (0.3 per cent) in 2021 to the third most common (8 per cent) in 2022.

Many new ransomware operators emerged in 2022, while some prominent ransomware groups launched their new versions (such as LockBIT 3.0).

Attacks on the government sector globally accounted for 4.1 per cent in 2021, which increased to 12.1 per cent in 2022.

IT and technology, e-commerce, and media, entertainment and marketing industries saw a decline in the number of attacks but remained in the top 10 industries targeted, said the report.

--IANS

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