IT IN BUSINESS

The state of cybercrime

The threat environment we face continues to evolve Cybercriminals are creative, well-resourced, well-organized, and innovative They move quickly to discover new threat vectors, use new exploits, and respond to new defences Attackers are opportunistic and will even switch lure themes daily in accordance with news cycles, as seen in cybercriminals’ use of the global COVID-19 pandemic to broadly target consumers, as well as to specifically target hospitals and healthcare providers

• Combination of BEC & credential phishing Microsoft tracks nation state activities to protect our platforms, our services, and our customers We use a variety of metrics and sophisticated data integration techniques to better understand targeting, motivations, and customer impact MSTIC focuses on nation state activities because these tactics, techniques, and procedures are often unique and novel, prompting downstream actors such as cybercriminals and smaller nation states to eventually copy their methods

When a customer (organization or individual account holder) is targeted or compromised by nation state activities that Microsoft tracks, we deliver a nation state notification (NSN) to the customer Over the past two years, Microsoft has delivered over 13,000 NSNs The highest percentage of NSNs represented activity originating in Russia, followed by Iran, China, North Korea, and other countries

Top 5 targeted geographic regions based on NSNs (July 2019–June 2020)

Security and remote workforce concerns

Security decision makers in the United States perceive their most common remote workforce challenge as remote workers making choices that reduce security Securing personal devices for remote work and the increase in phishing campaigns and identity fraud are also concerns

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Zero Trust deployment

By treating every access attempt as if it were originating from an untrusted network, the Zero Trust strategy helps solidify the security of VPNs for working from home This is precisely the approach needed with today’s remote workforces because they’re coming from untrusted home networks and the VPN architectures used to extend corporate networks are sometimes failing

Organizations face a broad range of risks from insiders

Countless security officers across the world are now asking themselves, “Is my organization effectively prepared to identify and remediate increasing insider risks?” One reason for this question is COVID-19 and the subsequent rapid digital transformation it has forced organizations to undertake According to a recent survey, the lives of up to 300 million information workers worldwide have been upended, and many are now working remotely with limited resources and increased stress 46 These employees are not only logging into enterprise environments and line-of-business applications but also accessing, editing, and sharing sensitive data

Stressors that increase insider risks in a remote work environment