Positive Technologies: information from financial organizations began to leak more often than funds

Due to hacker attacks on the financial sector, companies began to lose funds only in 6% of cases, while in 51% of incidents confidential data was stolen from banks and other related organizations. This indicator increased from 46% last year, follows from the report of Positive Technologies devoted to cybersecurity of the financial sector in Russia for the first three quarters of 2022. At the same time, as a result of attacks, business processes were stopped less often (for example, the unavailability of digital financial services for customers). The year-on-year growth was 42% against 54% last year. In general, it follows from the report, in the first three quarters of 2022, the total number of attacks on the sector decreased by 16% compared to the same period in 2021.

“The share of cyber attacks on the financial industry is now about 5% of all cyber attacks on organizations,” the company notes. This is due, among other things, to the growth of investments by banks and other organizations in the financial sector in cybersecurity, as well as the shift in the focus of attackers to attacks for the purpose of extortion in less protected organizations, explains Ekaterina Kilyusheva, head of the Positive Technologies information security analytics research group.

“The decrease in the number of cases of direct theft of funds in financial institutions may also be due to the difficulty of withdrawing money to foreign accounts, and in this situation, cybercriminals are looking for other opportunities,” recalls Vladimir Ulyanov, head of the analytical center at Zecurion. But the data, in his opinion, remains the main value for scammers.

Leaks of valuable information as a result of hacking the organization’s system began to happen more often, not only in the financial sector. So, according to InfoWatch, 305 databases “leaked” in the Russian Federation in the first half of the year, which is 45.9% more than in the same period of 2021. The amount of stolen information increased by more than 16 times, amounting to 187.6 million records. At the same time, material damage from such penetration in the spring exceeded 100 million rubles

The risk of theft of confidential information (personal data, banking secrecy) remains the most significant, says Alexei Voylukov, Vice President of the Association of Banks of Russia. With this information, scammers can make social engineering algorithms more personalized, and this increases the chance of success of such a scheme, he warns. At the same time, the main risks in general are not on the side of the financial institution, but on the client side, Mr. Voylukov warns. In 2023, the main problem may no longer be external, but internal threats, Vladimir Ulyanov believes: “Firstly, personnel are changing in companies due to population migration and the relocation of some previous employees abroad,” he explains. , the possibility of bribery of employees cannot be ruled out, this risk may also increase due to the unstable economic situation.”

Tatyana Isakova