September 2018 Cyber Threat Data: Ransomware Threats Double Monthly, Encrypted Threats Still Growing

We’re into October and based on this year’s reports so far, the threat landscape is continuing to evolve and change as the global cyber arms race grows.

Phishing attacks continue to trend downwards, with September data showing the volume of attacks down 92 percent compared to the same time last year. The reasons for this decline are not 100 percent clear, but may be partly attributed to increased awareness as people are becoming more adept at identifying phony websites and sharing information about common scams.

While phishing is still a threat, particularly as the holiday season approaches, it appears that cyber criminals are continuing to favor attacks involving malware, ransomware, TLS/SSL encrypted attacks and intrusion attempts. SonicWall Capture Advanced Threat Protection sandbox, with Real-Time Deep Memory Inspection (RTDMI^TM), has discovered 27,680 new attack variants this year, further evidence that cyber criminals are pursuing more sophisticated and coordinated methods of attack.

Globally, the SonicWall Capture Threat Network, which includes more than 1 million sensors across the world, recorded the following 2018 year-to-date attack data through September 2018:

• 8.5 billion malware attacks (54 percent increase from 2017)
• 2.9 trillion intrusion attempts (49 percent increase)
• 262.4 million ransomware attacks (108 percent increase)
• 1.9 million encrypted threats (56 percent increase)

In September 2018 alone, the average SonicWall customer faced:

• 1,662 malware attacks (24 percent decrease from July 2017)
• 791,015 intrusion attempts (19 percent increase)
• 56 ransomware attacks (99 percent increase)
• 70.9 encrypted threats (61 percent decrease)
• 10 phishing attacks each day (92 percent decrease)

 SonicWall Capture Security Center

SonicWall cyber threat intelligence is available in the SonicWall Security Center, which provides a graphical view of the worldwide attacks over the last 24 hours, countries being attacked and geographic attack origins. This view illustrates the pace and speed of the cyber arms race.

The resource provides actionable cyber threat intelligence to help organizations identify the types of attacks they need to be concerned about so they can design and test their security posture ensure their networks, data, applications and customers are properly protected.