While many institutions now take cybersecurity more seriously, the rapid evolution of cybercrime means they should focus on managing attacks as well as preventing them.
“Cyber resilience is an organizational – not technological – capability that improves an entity’s ability to deliver the desired outcome at any time,” said Joel Camissar, regional director of McAfee MVISION Cloud for Asia Pacific.
“As the threat of cybersecurity compromise is a reality for everyone, cyber resilience requires businesses to move from trying to avoid attacks to a position where they are able to mitigate downtime and to stay the course in the face of an attack. »
Financial institutions are an extremely lucrative target due to their vast stores of customer financial data. McAfee saw an 89% increase in reported incidents affecting the financial sector in 2019. Despite this, only a third of those surveyed by McAfee believe their organization is truly cyber resilient.
“As the cyber threat landscape continues to evolve, Australian organizations have no time for complacency,” Mr Camissar said.
“The low risk perception displayed when it comes to data breaches is indicative of a lack of awareness of the financial, reputational and operational impact that a cyber incident can have both in the short and long term. »
The increasingly digital economy is also changing the threat landscape. Cryptojacking – which involves targeting a victim’s computer with malware to mine cryptocurrencies without their knowledge – is on the rise, with McAfee detecting a 29% increase in incidents in the first quarter of 2019.
“The worrying rise in cryptojacking is the new form of cybercrime hitting the financial sector and everyone from consumers to businesses. [needs] take a proactive approach to cybersecurity to combat these growing attacks,” said Mr. Camissar.
