State-sponsored cyber spies target business secrets

The global Breach Level Index, to be published next week by Gemalto, reveals the number of state-sponsored cyber attacks accounted for just 2 per cent of data breach incidents during the first six months of 2015. However, the number of records compromised as a result of those attacks amounted to 42 per cent of the total. Further, while none of the top-ten breaches from the first half of 2014 were thought to be state sponsored, three in 2015 were. These included the top two breaches at Anthem Insurance and the US Office of Personnel Management. “State-sponsored attacks were the second highest source of data records loss, with 102.4 million, behind malicious outsiders responsible for 112 million,” says Jason Hart, chief technology officer for data protection at Gemalto. "Perhaps the biggest danger for any business, no matter which sector it operates in, is thinking its data isn’t sensitive enough to be of any interest” The days of such attacks being targeted purely at government organisations also seem to be over. According to threat forensics specialist FireEye, during the first six months of 2015 there have been considerably more state-sponsored cyber attacks on the private sector (87 per cent) compared with the public sector (13 per cent). The common link between all such attacks is the sensitive nature of the data targeted.