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In the age of cyberspace, there 's one issue that has never been brought up before as a global challenge -- cyber attack. Data from the Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR) showed that almost 1 million new threats have been created every day last year, with mobile apps as a growing platform to disclose data.
This is the 20th volume of ISTR, which was published by Symantec, an information protection company, during the ongoing INTERPOL World here on Tuesday. It is an annual study based on findings from Symantec's global intelligence network of 41.5 million attack sensors, monitoring threat activity in more than 157 countries and territories.
Based on the figures, people now are exposed to digital threats far more than they've imagined, with the total number of breaches increased 23 percent last year. Even though the number of mega breaches, which refers to incidents involved over 10 million identities exposed, has halved from eight in 2013 to only four this year, one in five of the breached companies did not report that their information on data has been exposed.
Symantec also uncovered 24 zero-day vulnerabilities (software holes unknown to the vendor) in 2014, a new record high over the last two decades. And the survey reveals that it took software companies an average of 59 days to create and roll out patches - up from only four days in 2013.
Peter Sparkes, Symantec's senior director of Cyber Security Services, Asia Pacific and Japan said that the top three industries under attack are oil, retail as well as manufacturing. And the Science industry, especially health-related areas, is emerging as a new target, because "medical records have value."
According to the survey, a total of 317 million malware variants have been recorded over last year, a 26-percent increase from 2013, which means, almost one million new threats were created every day.
And mobile apps are another invisible victim.
Symantec analyzed 6.3 million mobile apps in 2014, finding out that one in six are classified as malwares, and another 2.3 million were graywares, which refers to those with no harm but could possibly become a malware. Even a healthy app could share your data through the domains users have contacted, and from social media, app frameworks as well as advertisement networks.
One major way is to click the "accept" button. The survey showed that one in four end users admit not knowing what access they gave away when agreeing to terms of the app, and 66 percent said they were willing to trade privacy for a free app.
Email remains a significant attack vector for cybercriminals, but they continue to experiment with new attack methods across mobile devices and social networks to reach more people, with less effort, it said.
"Instead of doing the dirty work themselves, cybercriminals are taking advantage of unwitting users to proliferate their scams," added Sparkes. "Interestingly, the majority of such scams, up to 87 percent, were shared manually as attackers took advantage of the trust that people have in content shared by their friends."
To protect yourself from the attack and leakage of private information, here's the advice Symantec has given.
First, use strong passwords. "Use strong and unique passwords for your accounts and devices, and update them on a regular basis-- ideally every three months. Never use the same password for multiple accounts," it said.
Second, be cautious on social media.
Third, make sure you know what you're sharing when installing a network-connected device, such as a home router or thermostat, or downloading a new app. And disable remote access when not needed.
