Takeaway: With increasing numbers of cybersecurity attacks, foreign and domestic, organizations are even more likely to experience some kind of data breach threat this year. Knowing what that threat looks like, allows organizations to arm themselves against these eminent attacks and to implement policy regulations in time to prevent absolute exposure.

A recent study conducted by PwC demonstrated that due to increasing cybersecurity attacks, 69% of organizations will increase their cybersecurity investments in 2022. But what are the top cybersecurity attacks types organizations should be looking out for? Industry experts weighed in and here is what they said:

1. Ransomware Cyberattacks: According to previous studies, 71% of cyberattacks in 2020 were financially motivated. Ransomware attacks usually involve hackers holding a company’s database hostage in exchange for ransom, usually cryptocurrency. These types of cyberattacks are increasing in number. Downloading a single malicious file can severely expose a company’s finances and reputation. Companies must establish policies and controls that train employees on how to handle emails and files from unknown or untrusted sources.
2. 5G Vulnerabilities: Transferring data via cloud is now an absolute business necessity. With 5G being implemented by organizations, transfer speeds are expected to hit 10 GB per second. More transfer speed means increasing the pace of business. In turn, hackers are provided more opportunities to infect more data packages without companies noticing. Organizations should implement higher levels of security and stringent policies before relying on 5G for transfers.
3. Remote Work Vulnerabilities: As organizations increasingly enable employees to work from home, IT departments are becoming more decentralized and attack surfaces more expansive. In fact, 85% of cyberattacks involve some form of human element and 36% come from phishing. To mitigate these errors, organizations should invest in employee cybersecurity training and establish best practices like multi factor authentication and remote device monitoring. Using a zero-trust security framework to continuously validate users that access company data is also a highly recommended practice.
4. Synthetic Identities: Fraudsters compile real identifying data with fake data to create synthetic identities. A prevalent recent hacking scheme involves scammers passing through as viable candidates during the hiring process. Once hired, the scammer could be given full access to a company’s data system. According to McKinsey analysts, identity management, message security and network security are the main investments that companies must take to prevent breach by synthetic identity.

These are the top vulnerabilities organizations might face this year, and thus the need to have security controls and policy in place cannot be more significant. As hackers become savvier and harder to detect, organizations must be armed with the right cybersecurity tools and practices to avoid data breach and its costly consequences: financial loss and reputational damage.