By Srinath Srinivasan
Attacks on Indian cyber assets grew 207% in 2020 with New Delhi ranking fifth amongst the most attacked cities in the globe, as per the newest findings from Subex, an NSE-listed digital service provider for telcos.
According to the corporation, the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 was the time that cyber attacks went mainstream, and they continue to persist till date.
Kiran Zachariah, V-P, digital safety, Subex, mentioned, “2020 was also the year that saw a significant rise in inbound cyber attacks from North Korea and malware that can be linked to one of the clusters geotagged in North Korea’s approximate geographical vicinity.”
Washington DC, London, New York and Singapore have been the best 4 cities drawing the most cyber attacks. China tops the list of origin nations of the attacks globally, followed by North Korea, Iran, Russia and Ukraine.
India witnessed a 91% boost in attacks on manufacturing plants, with vaccine production extensively targeted. “Hackers were targeting disruption and pilferage of IP data and information on production capacities,” Zachariah mentioned. “The reconnaissance patterns and actual attacks that followed were aligned to the news on vaccine production that was coming out of the country,” he mentioned.
According to the findings, hackers look to be interested in studying about India’s vaccine manufacturing capabilities and manufacturing plants connected with the vaccines. “This seems to be part of an overall effort to study, monitor, and attack the manufacturing sector in the country,” he mentioned.
Zachariah also noted that there has been a 610% boost in the volume of regional information on the dark internet. “In terms of the data that has appeared on the dark web, there is enough information to indicate that there has been a huge rise in successful cyber attacks on various sectors, including retail, that involve huge volumes of customer information,” he mentioned.