Woburn, MA – April 16, 2020 – According to new analysis of the 2019 financial threat landscape, 773,943 users of Kaspersky solutions were attacked by banking Trojans, and of those users, a third (35.1%) were in the corporate sector.
Banking Trojans or ‘bankers’ are one of the most widespread tools for cybercriminals as they focus on stealing money. Bankers usually search for users’ credentials for e-payment and online banking systems, hijacking one-time passwords and then passing that data to the attackers.
Last year, a third of these attacks targeted corporate users, an increase from the figure (24%-25%) that has remained fairly consistent for the previous three years. According to experts, the rationale for this is clear: attacks on the B2B sector can not only provide access to banking or payment system accounts, but through employee exposure, can also compromise a company’s financial resources.
The collected data also shows that Russia held its position as the most targeted nation in 2019, accounting for more than 30% of global users attacked by banking malware. It is followed by Germany with a share of over 7% and China at more than 3%.
“While the overall number of banker attacks decreased in 2019, the growing interest for corporate users’ credentials indicates we are not yet seeing respite from financial threats,” said Oleg Kupreev, security expert at Kaspersky. “We therefore ask everyone to stay cautious when conducting financial operations online from PCs. While we are in the current peak of remote working during the coronavirus pandemic, it is especially important to not underestimate criminals’ desire for stealing money.”
The key findings of the report include:
Phishing:
- In 2019, the share of financial phishing increased from 44.7% of all phishing detections to 51.4%.
- Almost every third attempt to visit a phishing page blocked by Kaspersky products was related to banking phishing (27%).
- The share of phishing-related attacks on payment systems and online stores accounted for almost 17% and over 7.5% respectively in 2019.
- The share of financial phishing encountered by Mac users fell slightly, accounting for 54%.
Banking malware (Windows):
- In 2019, the number of users attacked with banking Trojans was 773,943, a decrease compared to the 889,452 attacked in 2018.
- 35.1% of users attacked with banking malware were corporate users, an increase from 24.1% in 2018.
- Users in Russia, Germany and China were attacked most frequently by banking malware.
Android banking malware:
- In 2019, the number of users that encountered Android banking malware dropped to just over 675,000 from around 1.8 million.
- Russia, South Africa and Australia were the countries with the highest percentage of users attacked by Android banking malware.
Threats targeting businesses, such as banking Trojans and financial phishing, can and should be detected and blocked on a network level even before they reach employee’s endpoints. In particular, the use of a secure internet gateway solution like Kaspersky Security for Internet Gateway ensures secure internet traffic and transactions and prevents many types of malware and threats. Kaspersky solution has received positive honest customer feedback and been named a 2020 ‘Customers’ Choice for Secure Web Gateways’.
To learn more about financial phishing and the other findings from the report, Financial Cyberthreats in 2019, read our blogpost on Securelist.com.
Gartner Disclaimer
Gartner Peer Insights Customers’ Choice constitute the subjective opinions of individual end-user reviews, ratings, and data applied against a documented methodology; they neither represent the views of, nor constitute an endorsement by, Gartner or its affiliates.
About Kaspersky
Kaspersky is a global cybersecurity company founded in 1997. Kaspersky’s deep threat intelligence and security expertise is constantly transforming into innovative security solutions and services to protect businesses, critical infrastructure, governments and consumers around the globe. The company’s comprehensive security portfolio includes leading endpoint protection and a number of specialized security solutions and services to fight sophisticated and evolving digital threats. Over 400 million users are protected by Kaspersky technologies and we help 270,000 corporate clients protect what matters most to them. Learn more at usa.kaspersky.com.
Media Contact:
Cassandra Faro
Cassandra.Faro@Kaspersky.com
781-503-1812
