85% are more concerned about ransomware attacks than other cyber threats

Fortinet, a global leader in broad, integrated, and automated cybersecurity solutions, today (September 30) unveiled the 2021 Global State of Ransomware Report.

The survey reveals most organisations are more concerned about ransomware than other cyber threats.

A recent FortiGuard Labs Global Threat Landscape report also found ransomware grew 1070 per cent year-over-year.

However, while the majority of organisations surveyed indicated they are prepared for a ransomware attack, including employee cyber training, risk assessment plans, and cybersecurity insurance, there was a clear gap in what many respondents viewed as essential technology solutions for protection and the technology that can best guard against the most commonly reported methods to gain entry to their networks.

Based on the technologies viewed as essential, organisations were most concerned about remote workers and devices, with Secure Web Gateway, VPN and Network Access Control among the top choices. 

While ZTNA is an emerging technology, it should be considered a replacement for traditional VPN technology. However, most concerning was the low importance of segmentation (31 per cent), a critical technology solution that prevents intruders from moving laterally across the network to access critical data and IP. 

Likewise, UEBA and sandboxing play a critical role in identifying intrusions and new malware strains, yet both were lower on the list. Another surprise was secure email gateway at 33 per cent, given phishing was reported as a common entry method of attackers.

Organisations more concerned about losing data

The top concern of organisations regarding a ransomware attack was the risk of losing data, with the loss of productivity and the interruption of operations following closely behind. 

In addition, 84 per cent of organisations reported having an incident response plan, and cybersecurity insurance was a part of 57 per cent of those plans.

In regards to paying ransoms if attacked, the procedure for 49 per cent of organisations was to pay the ransom outright, and for another 25 per cent, it depends on how expensive the ransom is. Of the one-quarter who paid a ransom, most, but not all, got their data back.

Ransomware concerns consistent globally

While concerns about ransomware were reasonably consistent across the board, there were some differences regionally. Respondents in EMEA (95 per cent), Latin America (98 per cent), and APJ (98 per cent) were only slightly more concerned about ransomware attacks than their peers in North America (92 per cent). 

All regions perceive the loss of data as the top risk associated with a ransomware attack, along with the worry that they will be unable to keep up with an increasingly sophisticated threat landscape. 

APJ, uniquely, lists the lack of user awareness and training as their top concern. 

Respondents in APJ and Latin America were more likely to have been victims of a ransomware attack in the past (78 per cent) compared to 59 per cent in North America and 58 per cent in EMEA. Phishing lures were a common attack vector everywhere, while remote desktop protocol (RDP) exploits and open vulnerable ports were top attack vectors in APJ and LatAm.

The need for integration and intelligence

Almost all respondents view actionable threat intelligence with integrated security solutions or a platform as critical to preventing ransomware attacks and see value in artificial intelligence (AI)-driven behavioural detection capabilities.

While almost all of those surveyed felt they are moderately prepared and plan to invest in employee cyber awareness training, it is clear from the survey that organizations need to recognize the value of investing in technologies like advanced email security, segmentation, and sandboxing, in addition to the mainstays of NGFW, SWG, and EDR, to detect, prevent, and limit ransomware.

Organisations must consider and evaluate these solutions to reduce risk given today’s ransomware tactics and techniques. The most advanced organisations will adopt a security approach for their ransomware protection strategy that is platform-based and provides core capabilities fully integrated with actionable threat intelligence.

They must also be designed to interoperate as a unified system and be enhanced with AI and machine learning to better detect and respond to ransomware threats. 

 “Unsurprisingly, organisations cited the evolving threat landscape as one of the top challenges in preventing ransomware attacks. As evidenced by our ransomware survey, there is a huge opportunity for the adoption of technology solutions like segmentation, SD-WAN, ZTNA, as well as SEO and EDR, to help protect against the threat of ransomware and the methods of access most commonly reported by respondents,” said John Maddison, EVP of Products and CMO at Fortinet.

“The high amount of attacks demonstrates the urgency for organisations to ensure their security addresses the latest ransomware attack techniques across networks, endpoints, and clouds. The good news is that organisations are recognizing the value of a platform approach to ransomware defence,” Maddison added.