Cyber security has become the latest ‘in-word’ around the globe. Putting the verbal fashion aside, organizations and individuals are struggling to protect themselves against online attacks and threats from left, right and center.
With the rate of information growing exponentially in value and in volume, cyber risks are increasingly posing serious threat to governments, businesses and economies around the world.
Fortunately, experts have found that the growing awareness about cyber security practices has helped nations like the US, Canada and Australia better prepare themselves against cyber attacks.
At the other side of the spectrum, the cyber attack business continues to grow exponentially with every passing day. A shocking prediction by a credible authority recently surfaced that 2017 will most probably see millions of cyber attacks not just over the year but in a single day as well.
Making things more horrible is the common knowledge that some countries are targeted more than other countries. The following are the 6 countries, written in descending order, which rank among the most targeted by cybercriminals.
1. Brazil
The news recently broke about Google Brazil getting hacked through DNS hijacking. Another high profile company also faced the wrath of hackers when, early Friday morning, all domains under UOL and Grupo Folha were redirected to the famous pornographic website RedTube. This responsibility for the attack was claimed by the Lone Wolf Attackers.
This wasn’t the beginning and it sure isn’t the end of it. In fact, every week we see individuals falling victim to cyber attacks, including DDoS and other attacks on a massive scale. It is clear that this region is attracting a lot of negative attention from the wrong people for all the wrong reasons. The situation becomes more shocking since Brazil does not even rank in the top 50 countries with highest internet penetration ratio.
2. Turkey
Turkey, which is listed amongst the top 20 countries in the world and has a population of over 75 million, faced major cyber attacks in the recent past, and as per predictions, will continue to face more devastating attacks in the near and distant future.
3. United States
One of the world’s largest countries, the US has a population of over 318 million. The US ranks as the fourth-favorite country of hackers. 2016 alone saw the breach of voter records and the Wendy’s Company suffering major malware attacks. Many other and most famous online service providers like Yahoo, LinkedIn, Dropbox, and others were also targeted in 2016.
4. India
India is expected to become a key target of cyber criminals since they plan on using malware to attack point-of-sales (POS) devices and mobile wallets in 2017, as per a research conducted by security software firm F-Secure.
“The increasing number of attacks, especially on Android devices is not a hidden fact. The situation is worrisome in India, when we take into account the kind of increase seen in the volume of online transactions in the last few weeks,” F-Secure Corporation President and CEO Samu Konttinen said last month.
There have been many cases of bank thefts, which cost the nation millions of dollars. The increasing scale and severity of these attacks is not hard to guess since every hour 15 ransomware attacks are spread in India, with one of every three Indians falling victim to it. And despite all their tries, banks have still not been able to stop them.
5. Philippines
Last year, we saw Philippines being in the spotlight after one of the largest bank heists in modern history. According to a report by US security company Symantec, the hacker responsible for stealing $81 million from the Bangladesh central bank had now targeted the Philippine bank.
The malicious software used in the Philippine incident was similar to the one used in the Sony hack, according to Symantec. The Philippine central bank has started to expand its cyber-security unit, placing banks and money changers under tighter scrutiny, and will start to regulate digital currencies to ward off laundering and technology crimes.
6. Indonesia
Cyber attacks in Indonesia are rising at an alarming rate and are expected to increase by 33% this year over 2015. Indonesia experiences many cyber attacks every day and most of these threats target e-commerce websites. It appears that the country, which has the population of over 246 million, has no coordinated cyber defense unit established yet.
Honorable Mention…
In the age of constant and consistent cyber security threats, it is only wise that one should do their best to increase their cyber security situation. I recommend that internet users in general, and internet users in Australia, should subscribe to a Australian VPN service, since it is an all-in-one online security solution, providing ultimate cyber security solutions to individuals and businesses around the globe.
About Author (Anas Baig):
Anas Baig is a Digital Marketer & Security Enthusiast. He loves to read & write about Digital Security & Privacy. If you are interested to get tweets about Marketing & Security! Follow him on twitter @anasbaigdm
