Security News > 2020 > August > Analysis of 92 billion rejected emails uncovers threat actors’ motivations

Mimecast released the Threat Intelligence Report: Black Hat U.S.A. Edition 2020, which presents insights gleaned from the analysis of 195 billion emails processed by Mimecast for its customers from January through June 2020.

The majority of attacks seen by Mimecast during this period were simple, high volume forms of attacks, such as spam and phishing that is likely a reflection of the ease of access to tools and kits available online.

As the attacks progressed, exploits evolved to more potent forms of malware and ransomware with the attacker's goal appearing to be monetary gain.

Interestingly, the media and publishing sectors suffered high volumes of impersonation attacks, potentially as a vehicle for cybercriminals to spread disinformation across the U.S. "If one thing is for certain, the pandemic we're living in today has caused significant challenges. We've continued to see threat actors tap into the vulnerabilities of humans and launch campaign after campaign with a COVID-19 hook, in attempt to get users to click harmful links or open malicious files," said Josh Douglas, VP of product management, threat intelligence at Mimecast.

Researchers found that it is highly likely that U.S. businesses are at risk of ransomware attacks, due to threat actors' efforts towards the high volume, opportunistic attack of multiple verticals.

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