Trend Micro Incorporated hosts a successful roundtable meeting to discuss cybersecurity at Waterfall

Trend Micro Incorporated detected a shift in focus from large-scale attacks to highly targeted ones, which are more lucrative.

And this trend is only getting worse, cyber attackers are using more sophisticated techniques to bypass early detection layers and trick high-profile victims.

The global cybersecurity leader detected and blocked more than 159 million email threats, around 8 million malicious URLs (website names), and over 22 million malicious mobile apps aimed at South African businesses and consumers between January and December last year.

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As a result, to discuss the latest threat developments facing cybersecurity professionals and security teams, Trend hosted a successful interactive roundtable session at Olives and Plates Ellipse, Waterfall on May 8.

A team of experts unpacked Trend Micro’s latest research, revealing how evolving cybercrime tactics are impacting businesses in South Africa.

Trend Micro’s 2023 Annual Cybersecurity Report highlights new patterns in the cybercrime landscape, as threat actors deviate from big-batch attacks to focus on a narrower range of high-profile targets.

These types of attacks are more difficult to block and require businesses to refine their processes and protocols to better combat them.

Trend Micro country managing director for African Cluster Gareth Redelinghuys said, “Our latest data shows that threat actors are fine-tuning their operations, shifting away from large-scale attacks, and instead focusing on a smaller range of targets but with higher victim profiles for maximum gain with minimum effort.

“As they continue to double down on tried and tested techniques, they are also delegating and streamlining operations — resulting in bolder, more effective strikes.”

In addition, attackers are launching more sophisticated attacks that bypass early detection layers like network and email filters by using specificity to trick a narrower field of high-profile victims.

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The use of generative AI in phishing attempts is also becoming more prevalent, branching beyond emails and texts to include persuasive audio and video ‘deepfakes’ for an even more business-affecting threat.

This introduces the possibility of everything from stock market manipulations to democratic or wartime disinformation campaigns, or smear attacks on public figures.

“Looking at the overall trend in decreasing ransomware threats, it might be tempting for local organisations to develop a false sense of security and lower their defences,” said Zaheer Ebrahim, Trend MIcro’s solutions architect for Middle East and Africa.

“However, our research shows that these increasingly sophisticated attacks are going to become more and more difficult for businesses to detect and they will be increasingly costly when they succeed. IT leaders must refine their processes and protocols to enable their defences to combat persistence with efficiency.”

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