76% of Cyberattacks Aim for Financial Gain

The most common type of malware over the past year has been ransomware.

Verizon has published a report on cyber threats from the past 12 months, based on information from 53,308 incidents across 65 countries. According to the report, 76% of all cyberattacks are financially motivated. The highest number of incidents were recorded in healthcare, real estate, government, retail, and finance sectors.

The report states that criminal organizations are responsible for 62% of external attacks, while system administrators are the main internal threat, causing 25.9% of incidents. Organized crime and government entities are responsible for 6% of incidents.

The most frequently targeted assets in cyberattacks were databases (19.6%), POS terminals (15.8%), POS controllers (15.8%), and web applications (13.7%).

Phishing is the most common attack vector, accounting for about 96% of incidents. Ransomware was the most widespread type of malware over the past year.