2018 and 2019 have been the worst years on record when it comes to machine identity attacks. This comes from a new report submitted by Venafi, which argues that the machine identity attacks are exploding.
The number of reported machine identity attacks grew by 400% in both 2018 and 2019. In the last five years alone, the figure shows a 700% increase. These are staggering numbers that Venafi argues are not being taken seriously.
Many machines are vulnerable, and the attackers know that most devices are unaware of the threats with minimal coverage.
A growing trend
Venafi claims that the number of vulnerabilities grew by 260%, with the 2018 to 2019 period alone seeing a 125% growth in attacks. Anything that moves that fast should always be taken seriously in the cybersecurity space.
The report also says that there have been incidences of commodity malware that hijacks the machine identities for criminal purposes.
Venafi says that the number of these incidences has doubled in the last two years and grown by 300% over the previous five years. The number of reported sophisticated and persistent threats using machine identities seems to have risen by 400% in that time.
Machine components are ignored
Venafi says that the machine identity component in cyberattack does not get as much attention as possible when it comes to many public reports about attacks. Because of this, there is not enough data available on this specific issue.
There is not much focus on this issue by the cybersecurity industry, which means that attackers are taking advantage of this nonchalance and launching many attacks on machine identity components.
According to Yana Blachman, the Threat Intelligence Researcher at Venafi, the trends are likely only a part of what may be a massive hacking campaign.
7 hours ago
