Cylance global research finds 46% of organisations are concerned with threat posed by cybercriminals

The report outlines how both old and new attack forms are top-of-mind for security teams, and show that the majority of businesses across the globe are either currently or planning to incorporate machine learning in their endpoint defenses.

Key findings from the report include:

• • Machine learning is a leading strategy for endpoint security: Forty-seven percent of respondents have deployed machine learning for endpoint security, with 23% currently testing the technology. Thirty-two percent said machine learning is detecting new and unknown malware that evades other endpoint security solutions and 25% are deploying the technology to increase productivity.
• • Ransomware remains top concern: Nearly half (46%) of organisations experienced a ransomware attack in the previous twelve months, impacting more than 5% of their endpoints in most cases (56%). Of those, 60% experience a recurrence of the same ransomware, but only 12% paid the ransom.
• • Known malware is a problem, but unknown strains are an even bigger concern: Thirty-five percent of respondents indicated that known malware was the most common threat faced in the past two years. Twenty-nine percent ranked unknown malware as the top attack form, with 44% naming it as the greatest risk to their organisations’ endpoints.
• • Cybercriminals top the list of bad actors: Ninety percent of responses are concerned or extremely concerned with the threat posed by cybercriminals, followed by nation-states (82%), hacktivists (79%) and insiders (78%).
• • Attacks on endpoints primarily impact productivity and operations: Thirty-two percent of respondents ranked interruptions to standard business operations as the top impact of compromised endpoints (32%), followed by impeding the productivity of knowledge workers (31%), and delays to other IT projects (28%).

“The threat landscape is constantly changing, but this research shows that just because an attack form is old, doesn’t mean it won’t remain effective,” said Doug Cahill, senior analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group. “There is one reason phishing attacks are of extreme concern to 47% of businesses: they work. While new threats and zero-days will continue to keep security teams up at night, it will be a mixture of the old and new attack forms that keep them busy.”