6 Noteworthy Cyber Attacks of 2021

My Geek Score: All of us are quite aware of technically advanced apps and software’s. But how much is this harmful, probably we all are unaware of it. Today the cybercrime is taking a hike with turning the table by increasing negative impact on software industries. As per reports, in 2020 around $1 trillion damages were reported with cybercrime related factors and confirmed cases. More over the pandemic bought a major advantage to the cause of cyber-crime. Globally companies have learned several valuable lessons relating to securing of their globally distributed infrastructure. This simultaneously have been witnessed with large scale data breaching as well as with experiencing of own security incidents. Rather these issues have bought on a threat to the grooming IT sector.

Moving ahead with 2021, the figure of such recent cyber-attacks has increased and is creating threat further.

Ransomware-As-A-Service Attacks:-

This is quite a common one active in making a serious impact for marking a target to cyber-attacks of 2021. As a service, the Ransom ware has been growing into popularity with creating new possibilities for the non-traditional hackers. Indeed it can be counted as a part of recent cyber-attacks noted.

 Next comes the list of noteworthy cyber attacks of 2021 which have created havoc in the history of cyber crime.

Accellion Supply Chain Attack

With this recent cyber-attack, a lot of confidential data were stolen from large organization like singtel. It happened the way that many other organizations have compromised their action than initially Accellion had. The incident had impacted a lot on its partners and customers globally. It’s because of the priority of Accellion which is based to sharing of secured data and collaboration software. The role of the company stands with content firewall that has leveraged more than 3000 global corporations as well as other organizations. The Accellion file transfer suffered a zero loss during the December in 2020 and again in January 2021. As per research reports, there were a set of threat actors relatively connected to the matter (FIN11) and ganged to commit such pathetic crime. Click Here

Attack on the University of the Highlands and Islands

This recent cyber-attack is related to Scotland’s university of the highlands and islands. Due to this incident, nearby sites across UHI’s network bearing 13 colleges and research institutions were also closed. It was later disclosed that a group of IT engineers worked on the system to isolate and minimize the impact of the cyber-crime. It was also reported that, criminals involved in this demanded for ransom to unlock the Sepa systems. The affected areas are the university sites across Scotland. These include northern and western isles, highlands, moray and Argyll.

Acer Ransom Ware Attack

Even during the times of noted cyber-attacks 2021, the hard ware giant Acer suffered with a planned security breaching. It is reported that the incident can be considered among the biggest cybercrime. Later it was found from sources that the hackers got the access to the details through the network released from Taiwanese computer manufacturer. As per information sources, it was until the 28^th of March Acer had to pay the ransom of $ 50 million else the data would leak which were collected as a part of the theft.

Bombardier Data Breach

This incident occurred in February 2021 when the aerospace company suffered cyber-crime with attackers gaining access through zero day vulnerability. Still ongoing investigation indicates an unauthorized access which is limited.

With reports from forensic analysis, it was sorted that there are still issues with confidential as well as personal information shared to employees, customers as well as suppliers. It’s also reported that as an impact of this cybercrime, approximately 130 employees across Costa Rica were impacted. Later bombardier confirmed that the company was not targeted specifically and its vulnerability impacted various other organizations with the use of this application.

Microsoft Exchange Server Attack

It was on 2^nd of March 2021, when micro soft experienced a black day. Rather the day was called as zero days when multiple exploits were detected. The exploits were being used to attack on premises of the Microsoft exchange server. This served with cyber criminals to access the administrative matters. Since a long time, hackers have been digging their sight to this attack and that has also brought down a lot of loss to the organization.

CNA Insurance Attack

This is not just a single day matter, but every day there are some or the other cyber-crimes occurring noted among recent cybercrimes. It was revealed that, CNA’s system was infected with ransom ware. It was in May that two sources who were not identified due to lack of authorization to discuss the matter. It was disclosed later that, CNA had paid $40 million ransom to the hackers for releasing of its systems and data. But the best part being CNA’s quick recovery of the information which avoided the source to share any kind of data with others.

These kinds of cyber crimes are not new anymore. Even though we are taking technology to new height, still we are facing a lot of issues technically day to day.