Microsoft issues report on major cyber threats in 2018

Microsoft has published a report on cyber threats, after analyzing more than 6.5 trillion signals passing through the company's cloud services.
 
The study says that the number of phishing attacks in the world increased by more than 350% in 2018. The average monthly phishing rate increased from 0.14% (644 million emails per month) to 0.49% (2.254 billion per month). Microsoft believes that this trend will remain in the future, since the actions of the attackers are not aimed at finding technical vulnerabilities, but at human weaknesses.
 
Microsoft analysts noted a 73% decrease in the number of ransomware attacks, and that the attackers switched to more secretive attack methods, as users began to more competently respond to threats; they refuse to pay the attackers and back up data.
 
The monthly average number of ransomware attacks (0.05%) was lower in 2018 than that of cryptocurrency mining attacks (0.12%). The attackers began to actively implement hidden digital currency mining programs and began to use the computing power of their victims' computers to generate cryptocurrencies. Intrusion not only reduces system performance, but can inflict more substantial damage.
 
Ethiopia (5.58%), Tanzania (1.83%) and Pakistan (1.47%) are among the countries that suffered the most from cryptocurrency mining attacks, DailyComm reports.

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