Cyberattacks cases have surged to twofold in a year: Report
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In July, two of the country’s biggest banks started getting complaints that their customers were unable to access any online services. An hour later, it was discovered that professional cyber criminals had launched DDOS (distributed denial of services) attacks from servers traced to Pakistan.
In this case, the banks were able to wrest back control of their servers using professional help without having to pay any ransom. But they’re not alone in becoming targets — as Indian companies see growth, many of them are facing increasingly coming to the attention of cyberattackers. Such incidents in India have surged to 6,284, thus far in the current financial year, from 2,895 reported cases in FY15, according to a report by PriceWaterhouscoopers (PwC). According to the report, financial losses due to such attacks have risen 135% in the past year. Industry estimates put such losses at $4 billion annually.
“With rapidly growing interconnected business operations and increasing digitization, the cybersecurity challenges will only grow and effective measures need to be taken to ensure protection against cyberattacks and threats,” said Sivarama Krishnan, partner, cybersecurity leader, PwC India. The motives for the attacks include economic advantage to espionage and even disruption and destruction of companies. The attacks have become more sophisticated in the last few years, which means defences also need to be better. In the case of a Vadodara-based, listed company, a phishing attempt originated in an email that came from an address similar to that of a client. It sought payment for a consignment to be paid into a new bank account. “The phishing attacks are not random ones like earlier.
These criminals first map the target, they exactly know what their likes are dislikes are and only then they are targeted,” said a senior police official. “Organisations in India are looking towards innovative cybersecurity solutions and we’ve seen a growth in security budgets over the past few years that can support this trend,” Krishnan said.
Many Indian companies have also faced extortion demands from cybercriminals and at least two are said to have paid up in the last few months
