Security News > 2020 > February > Malware infection attempts appear to be shrinking... possibly because miscreants are less spammy and more focused on specific targets

Attempts to infect computers with ransomware and other malware over networks are decreasing, reckons infosec outfit Sonicwall.

That may be because more and more attacks are tailored for individual, specific targets, rather than being spammed out, and thus not well detected by internet watchers and their honeypots.

"Attacks," the outfit said, "Were more evasive with higher degrees of success, particularly against the healthcare industry, and state, provincial and local governments."

Public sector organisations are becoming a more popular target among ransomware crooks because they're perceived as being more likely to roll over and pay ransoms in order to get their files back.

Interestingly, cryptojacking - malware that uses your device's compute power to secretly mine cryptocurrency on behalf of lazy script kiddies - was apparently down 78 per cent by volume, as seen by Sonicwall, since July 2019.

News URL

https://go.theregister.co.uk/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2020/02/04/sonicwall_threat_report/