No matter what your company makes or what services it provides, there’s always a possibility it might become a target of a cyberattack, whether random or deliberately planned to harm your business. Cybersecurity should always be one of the main priorities when it comes to running a business but in some industries, the threat of targeted cyber attacks is much higher than in others. Here are the top 5 areas of business targeted by cyber attackers.
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Business – the main target of cybercriminals
Business is an incredibly broad industry category that encompasses countless big and small companies that work in various branches or retail, food industry, manufacturing and more. While large nation-wide companies have the resources to set up robust cybersecurity defenses and ward off most hacking attempts, small businesses often don’t have enough spare resources that can be allocated to cybersecurity, making them an easy target for attackers.
Medical industry – a powerful target for cyberattacks
While it may not be obvious, the healthcare industry is full of very attractive and potentially lucrative targets for cybercriminals. Health care organizations and entities store tons of personal information about patients, including health records, personal details, financial information, insurance details and more. All of this can be used for significant monetary gain, which is why governments around the world have very strict cybersecurity requirements for entities in the medial industry.
Financial industry – one of the top targets for cyberattacks
It’s no surprise that companies that operate in the finance industry often become targets for hackers. After all, cybercriminals want money and access to personal information, and the finance industry has both. Luckily, the industry is heavily regulated when it comes to cybersecurity – the FDIC sets strict requirements for penetration testing and other cybersecurity measures for all credit unions, banks and other entities in the finance industry. However, even despite these requirements, roughly 30% of all financial institutions have been successfully attacked with an average of 85 attack attempts on a single business happening every year.
Targeted hacks on educational institutions
Schools and universities are some of the most attractive targets for hackers. First of all, there’s a huge number of people who have access to various platforms, programs and resources. Secondly, there’s a lot of turnover in this population of people, as students begin their studies and graduate every year. This means that there are lots of opportunities for hackers to use social engineering to gain unauthorized access. Plus, students often use weak or repeating passwords for their accounts. When it comes to educational institution hacker attacks, criminals usually go after computer processing power that can be used to mine cryptocurrencies, for example, personal information of thousands of students and employees and even intellectual property acquired by researchers on campus.
