AMU Cyber & AI

Report: Trust in Internet Will Plummet in 2017

Ransomware will continue to be an issue in 2017

Further problems with ransomware and other types of cybercrime will continue to erode trust in the Internet in 2017, according to a report from Intel Security.

Intel Security’s McAfee Labs recently published its [link url=”http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/reports/rp-threats-predictions-2017.pdf” title=”2017 Threats Predictions”], which called attention to multiple security issues that persist as 2016 ends.

At the top of the list is growing concern about ransomware. Ransomware is a type of malware that typically shuts down access to a computer system until a sum of money (i.e. ransom) is paid to unlock the machine.

Ransomware problems will bottom out

According to the report, ransomware problems are predicted to continue to grow as 2017 progress before bottoming out around midyear. That is, ransomware attacks will peak in the middle of next year but then begin to recede.

Ransomware attacks grew 80 percent in 2016, but law enforcement actions along with anti-ransomware technologies are working to reverse the trend.

“To overcome the designs of our adversaries, we need to go beyond understanding the threat landscape to changing the defender-attacker dynamics in six key areas: information asymmetry, making attacks more expensive, improving visibility, better identifying exploitation of legitimacy, improving protection for decentralized data, and detecting and protecting in agentless environments.” — [link url=”http://www.mcafee.com/us/about/news/2016/q4/20161129-01.aspx” title=”Vincent Weafer”], vice president of McAfee Labs

IoT security needs work

Out-of-the-box insecurity of a lot of Internet of Things (IoT) devices will also continue to be a big issue in 2017. History has already proved that thousands of hacked IoT devices can–when put in the virtual hands of cyber criminals–can literally [link url=”https://amuedge.com/iot-blame-massive-ddos-attack/” title=”take down parts of the Internet”].

With more focus on IoT security and the continued evolution of anti-malware and anti-ransomware technologies, hope could be around the bend. But, according to McAfee Labs at least, things are likely to get worse before getting better.

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