According to a recent Cybersecurity Ventures report, the costs of global cybercrime will double that of 2015 with figures rising up to $6 trillion annually by 2021. These costs include, but are not limited to, data damage and destruction, stolen capital, intellectual property theft, post-theft business disruption, investigation and restoration of hacked data and system.
The anonymous and impersonal nature of cyberterrorism has empowered cybercriminals to produce more and more malware each day. In 2015 alone, malware had a production rate of 230,000 new samples per day. Among those targeted, the healthcare industry is recorded to have been most prone to cyber-attacks, followed by the manufacturing, financial services, government and transportation agencies.
Vice President of Security and Compliance Consulting for the Herjavec Group Robert Steadman criticizes “the lack of user awareness…combined with a significant uptick in criminal activity (and improved tactics)” for the large scale private and public sector breaches. As ransomware attacks are set to increase by 300 percent this year, the need for preparedness and resiliency is vital to stop the growing cybercrime epidemic. But, as Herjavec Group Founder and CEO Robert Herjavec stated, “so long as there is a way for cybercriminals to get paid, with limited risk, attacks will continue.”