So far as 2018 progresses, the year seems rather promising with the exception of recurrence of “Black Monday” on 5 February 2018 which witnessed the biggest Dow Jones drop of all time over the stock markets. Cryptocurrency also went with the dive since achieving historical high late last year.

For the cybersecurity sector, no boom and bust cycle yet as the year entered the second month. However, US-headquartered security technology firm, A10 Networks highlighted to Hackwarenews on the cyber threats trend ahead for 2018.

Bigger, bolder and costlier cyber-attacks expected in 2018

Song Tang Yih, vice president Asia Pacific of A10 Networks told Hackwarenews that cyber-attacks in 2018, will be bigger, bolder and much costlier for victims.

“For 2017, spending on cybersecurity reached USD86 billion which was a humongous amount,” said Song.

Furthermore, he noted that the average data breach cost in 2017 accounted to around USD 4 million, while the annual cyber-attack cost ballooned to USD 400 billion alone. Using these past data, Song expected an increasing volumes of cyber-attacks in 2018, as hackers used more sophisticated approaches such as “Reaper malware” to breach vulnerabilities in systems for financial benefits.

More state-sponsored attacks expected

Some of these cyber-attacks were believed to be state-sponsored in nature at a bid to obtain hard currency as voiced out by Jonathan Tan, regional vice president, ASEAN and Pakistan of A10 Networks.

“There is no good time or bad time, where the hackers will rest. In fact, more so during the bad time, hackers will hack for finance gains.” commented Tan.

Some of the cyber-attacks were believed by Tan to be inspired by regional tensions among countries which eventually conducted cyberwars to breach each other systems. To Tan, Singapore is in the forefront of this battle due to the connectivity among its various governmental services and its ambition of becoming an IT-savvy Smart Nation.

Telco Operators on the hit list

Beside government networks, Tan expected Telecommunication (telecom) operator to be next victims due to its role in serving as the conduit for businesses. In his opinion, the hackers will seek to exploit Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) or Internet of Things (IOT) vulnerabilities.

Cameras and surveillance system run via the telecom network will also be another vulnerable spots for attacks to compromises corporates securities or simply to bring the whole network down to the attackers’ advantages.

The Challenges of merging various Cloud platforms

In 2018, Song estimated more corporations and organisation to merge their private clouds with public clouds into multi-cloud environments for scalability purposes. The merging processes, however might provide more vulnerabilities for data breaches and the call for the protection of personal data online is more needed than ever.

The good news is that there are already some partnership and technology development set in motions to smooth out the merging of private and public cloud. For instance, software giants like Microsoft, Azure and Google have come together to provide uniform set of infrastructures and application program interface (API) for hybrid clouds to further improve efficiency.

Deceptive technology to act as sheepdog against cyber-attacks

Despite the various threats, security services providers like A10 Networks has something in their sleeves against cyber-attacks. One of the weapons will be using adaptive, deceptive and predictive security products to prevent cyber-attacks.

To certain extent, Tan even dubbed the deceptive and predictive technology into a “Top Five Technology” in 2018. As these know-hows give security operators the ability to predict a cyber-attack that is yet to happen.

“Deceptive and predictive technology allows the security firm to trick the hackers to stay ahead of them and protect systems,” concluded Tan.

In his opinion, the digital security will eventually become a basic human right issue as our world gets more interconnected and our dependence on safe communication become close to our needs for clean air, water and food.

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In some extend, some of the “victims” did not even know that their information technology (IT) system have been breached by malicious code and virus, according to Application Intelligence Report (AIR) complied by US-based computering firm, A10 Network.

Almost one in two companies hacked on average in 2017

On the all-telling reports, the US-based A10 Network surveyed over 2000 businesses and IT leaders globally on the knowledge and attitudes toward cyber-security. The survey was conducted between two targeted groups, the IT decision makers and employees of the corporations.

The findings were then rather alarming as nearly half or 44% of the companies surveyed, indicated that they have either been a victim of a DDoS attack or do not know if they have been attacked.

To be specifically, 33% of the companies polled recognized that their IT system had been breached at least once over the past 12 months, while 11% polled were still left in dark of whether at least a cyber-attack had occurred to its IT infrastructure over the past one year.

Ignorance is not bliss

On further surveys with the companies’ employees revealed nonchalant attitudes toward a DDoS attack or simply the lack of awareness in this area. As such, the AIR recorded 55% of the participating employees claimed little or no knowledge of what a DDoS attack is.

Similarly, 11% of the participants were left in the dark and unsure if they have been attack or not by DDoS over the past year. Therefore in addressing to this knowledge gap, over 90% of the IT decision makers of the corporations believed cyber-security education were needed to create the awareness among employees.

Yet to rub salt to employees’ ignorance of DDoS, almost a quarter or 23% of the IT decision makers expected the education to do little or no improvement in employees’ attitude toward corporate cyber-security best practices over the next 12 months, as opposed to 77% whom believe optimistically that improvement is nigh.

Gloom and doom for 2018

The IT decision makers’ pessimism did not stop there, as over half of the personnel polled or 60% expected the DDoS attacks to intensify in 2018. This was due to the hackers using more sophisticated approaches, where the sizes and the frequency of DDoS attacks are estimated to increase as well.

As such, only around 36% of IT decision makers are only slightly optimistic about their ability to stop threats and protect their companies. However, they cited the need for ongoing support and corporate commitment to cyber-security policy and enforcement to fend off rising attacks.

Changed attitudes with right infrastructure forms the best defense

After the publication of the report, Jonathan Tan, Regional Vice President of A10 Networks for ASEAN and Pakistan, told Hackwarenews the need to change corporate attitudes and behaviors in the ever-present threat of cyber-attacks.

“We believe that a business’ cyber defense infrastructure is critical,” said Tan.

For instance, the simple practice of changing password regularly and the two-factor or multi-factor authentication can make a difference in cyber-security. Regular email reminders for updating passwords can also help to minimize data breaches.

“The enterprises must also take on a proactive and ongoing approach towards educating the workforce on cyber security threats and precautions.” he concluded.

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