Trustwave details financial sector cyberthreats

Cybersecurity and managed services provider Trustwave has published a new report detailing critical cybersecurity threats facing the financial services industry.

According to the report, the sector is facing persistent threats ranging from email-borne malicious attachments to abuse of valid accounts, with one of the major threats to the industry being ransomware.

Analysis from Trustwave SpiderLabs suggests that one single group, the Clop threat group, accounts for 39% of ransomware incidents targeting the sector. Other prevalent threat actors operating across the sector include LockBit, BlackCat, Black Basta, 8Base, Akira and Royal.

Common threat tactics aimed at the sector also include business email compromise, brute forcing of credentials, and malware.

Unique challenges faced by the sector include the requirement to hold a vast amount of sensitive customer data (painting a big target on the sector) as well as the industry’s heavy regulation and the importance of the need to maintain trust as a currency.

Trustwave CISO Kory Daniels said in the competitive financial services industry, the role of security in earning and sustaining consumer trust is paramount.

“For financial institutions, it isn’t just about protecting data, it’s about safeguarding the financial wellbeing and peace of mind of customers, partners and investors,” he said.

“Our latest threat briefing is a valuable resource for business leaders and cyber defenders within the financial services sector, providing a comprehensive view of the threats observed by our SpiderLabs team, along with specific mitigation strategies to help organisations protect extremely sensitive data and assets.”

In terms of targets, 51% of targeted companies reporting a breach are from the US, with India (9%) coming in a distant second, followed by Russia and Mexico (7% each), the report found.

Meanwhile HTML attachments make up 78% of file types being used for email-borne malware attachments, with 33% of these employing obfuscation as a means of defence evasion.

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