It’s no secret that cybercrime is on the rise yearly. With an estimated 22% of businesses having experienced a cyberattack in 2024 alone, this should alarm you. After all, these attackers are after your assets and data; you must ensure you know everything possible about what you could be facing.
It’s crucial to delve into the past to understand the present and prepare for the future. By learning from recent cyberattacks, you can stay ahead of the game and protect your business from potential threats in 2024.
In this blog, we’ll review the four worst cyberattacks in 2024 (so far) to ensure you know exactly how to protect your business from these attacks. We’ll also tell you how you can reach out to us for extra support to ensure you have a helping hand in protecting yourself against the worst attacks.
In early 2024, French ministerial services were hit by heavily dedicated denial of service (DDoS) attacks claimed to have been committed by the Sudanese branch of the worldwide hacktivist collective Anonymous. A DDoS attack sends many requests to a server to overload it, essentially causing a denial of service and downtime for the server being attacked.
While DDoS attacks may not be as invasive as other cyber threats, they can still wreak havoc on your organisation. The downtime they cause can disrupt your operations and damage your reputation, making them a serious concern for any business.
Thankfully, services like Microsoft Azure DDoS protection can shield your organisation from such attacks. These services have evolved over the past decade, making them an essential part of your cybersecurity strategy.
March 2024 brought a cyberattack on The National Health Service (NHS) in Dumfries and Galloway, causing a small number of patient files to become entangled in a ransomware attack. The attack was committed by the group Inc. Ransom involved around three terabytes of data, according to their darknet blog.
This shows that the public sector is not only exempt but is a significant target for these kinds of attacks. Ensuring that you’re protected as a public health organisation is vital, as you become an easy target for crippling public infrastructure.
The best way to counter a cyberattack using ransomware is to use software such as Microsoft Defender for Endpoint to proactively stamp out these threats and ensure they don’t worsen your business.
Ireland’s Health Service Executive (HSE) has had over 470 legal proceedings issued against it concerning a cyberattack that weakened the service’s IT systems and leaked the data of thousands of patients and staff in 2021.
This attack, perpetrated by Conti, a Russian cybercrime group, was the biggest-ever attack on a healthcare service worldwide. However, the litigation was caused by the HSE’s brittle security posture. According to the report conducted by PwC on the attack, there was a ‘known low level of cybersecurity maturity’.
With over 90,000 people affected by the incident whose data is now possibly anywhere on the dark web, there is surefire reason for individuals to be worried about the aftermath of the breach. This shows how failing to prepare for a cyber incident can worsen your organisation.
The whole HSE cyberattack and its aftermath should be a cautionary tale to any organisation failing to ensure a solid cybersecurity posture. They show the dangers of flaunting compliance regulations and other cybersecurity standards that keep customers and their data safe from attackers.
In early 2024, a Mother of All Breaches (MOAB) occurred. 26 billion records were leaked from LinkedIn, Twitter, Weibo, Tencent, and other platforms. This is the most significant data breach ever discovered, resulting from a firewall misconfiguration. While it’s unclear who has the MOAB of 26 billion records, the perpetrator is interested in large amounts of data.
This could make them a data broker, a hacker, or even a service that uses the data for its benefit. It’s impossible to say, as this data can be used differently. From fraud and targeted attacks to phishing and even account access, it’s easy for anyone with this data to wreak havoc for tons of people worldwide.
This is especially dangerous as the leak did contain passwords, which means that anyone who uses passwords between accounts is in danger, after all if your password is in the leak, it is now accessible and can be used on other platforms with the same password.
This is why it’s vital to avoid using the same password on multiple accounts and to generate a new password for each account you create.
Cyberattacks are a real modern threat, and ensuring you’re aware of the threats that any modern company can come up against is vital. By knowing about these attacks, you’ll be able to ensure that you can take decisive action and stop yourself from ending up in the same situation — or worse.
Are you looking to strengthen your organisation’s security but don’t know how? Our experts are here to help you explore the wide range of security tools available.
Get in touch with us now and see how we can help.