Security News > 2021 > August > Ransomware Volumes Hit Record Highs as 2021 Wears On

Ransomware has seen a significant uptick so far in 2021, with global attack volume increasing by 151 percent for the first six months of the year as compared with the year-ago half.

From a hard-number perspective, the ransomware scourge hit a staggering 304.7 million attempted attacks within SonicWall Capture Labs' telemetry.

Ransomware volume jumped from 115.8 million attacks in Q1 to 188.9 million attacks in Q2. "Even if we don't record a single ransomware attempt in the entire second half, 2021 will already go down as the worst year for ransomware SonicWall has ever recorded," according to the report.

Europe felt the brunt of the spikes in volume, with a 234 percent spike in ransomware attacks in the first half, according to SonicWall.

While Europe as a region saw the most pain, the U.S. recorded far and away the most ransomware attacks, the analysis found, with attack volume in the U.S. rising 185 percent from the first half last year.

"Government customers are still seeing a higher-than-average number of ransomware attempts, but in three out of six months during the first half of 2021, education customers saw even more," noted the report.

News URL

https://threatpost.com/ransomware-volumes-record-highs-2021/168327/