Egypt, Brazil, US, India, Mexico, and Pakistan among Top 10 countries with most malware attacks in the last four years.
Over 11million malware attacks were performed by hackers in the last four years, reveals the latest study by NordPass.
The study also investigated which countries are the most targeted, which credentials are the most leaked, and which type of malware Internet users fall victim to the most frequently.
From 2020 to 2022, the number of malware attacks reported has grown from over 600,000 to almost 5million. In the first nine months of 2023, over 2.7million cases were reported.
“We noticed that cybercriminals are using increasingly sophisticated hacking techniques and targeting their attacks more precisely, including towards governmental institutions and critical infrastructure,” says Tomas Smalakys, chief technology officer of NordPass.
“This year, the FBI seized control of hundreds of routers infected by malware that was targeting critical infrastructure.”
Having investigated which online credentials hackers aim to steal, researchers found that the most popular cloud servers, email accounts, and social media platforms are their prime targets, according to a report sighted by Digital TimesNG.
According to Smalakys, threat actors usually seek monetary gain and access to sensitive platforms gives them the leverage to demand a ransom payment, sell data, or otherwise exploit stolen accounts.
These are the most targeted domains:
* accounts.google.com – 8.2million stolen records.
* facebook.com – 5.9million stolen records.
* login.live.com – 5.6million stolen records.
* m.facebook.com – 3.2million stolen records.
* Instagram.com – 3.1million stolen records.
* discord.com – 3.1million stolen records.
* netflix.com – 3million stolen records.
* roblox.com – 2.8million stolen records.
* com.facebook.katana – 2.5million stolen records.
* amazon.com – 2.4million stolen records.
* paypal.com – 2.3million stolen records.
* twitter.com – 2.3million stolen records.
“Malware steals data from places you may not imagine, including Excel sheets, browsers and text documents where many save their passwords and other important credentials,” says Smalakys.
“Internet users are still not aware of the consequences these attacks may have on their lives. Granting hackers access to, let’s say, your Google account could initially block you from your digital life given that many of us use Google to join other platforms too.”
The study showcases that Brazil, the US, and India are the countries whose Internet users experienced the most malware attacks in the past four years. While no European country got into the top 10, France ranks 15th and takes the lead for the highest number of users affected by malware in Europe.
The top 10 are as follows:
* Brazil – 9.6m affected users.
* US – 6.9m affected users.
* India – 6.9m affected users.
* Indonesia – 5.3m affected users.
* Vietnam – 3.6m affected users.
* Egypt – 3.5m affected users.
* Mexico – 3.04m affected users.
* The Philippines – 2.9m affected users.
* Turkey – 2.8m affected users.
* Pakistan – 2.8m affected users.
Based on the study, the most prevalent types of malware in the last four years have been RedLine (attacks constitute 59% of the total records collected), Vidar (18%), and Raccoon (12%). Other common types of malware include AZORult, CryptBot, Taurus, and Meta Stealer.
