Decline in hacktivism, growth in cybercrime

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The same pattern has been seen in hacktivism activities, which slowed across the board in June and July despite having actively targeted real estate and mining businesses owned by Russian oligarchs earlier in the year. However, Ukraine and its allied countries remain the constant target of cyber espionage operations carried out primarily by threat actors from Russia and Belarus.

Looking at the state of cyber events more broadly, analysis shows that financially motivated cybercrime remains the dominant form of cyber attack making up 72% of all incidents so far this year. Other findings include:

1. Healthcare continues to be the most targeted sector for cyber criminals, accounting for 14% of all cyber events so far this year. Of those attacks, just 0.5% could be attributed to cyber warfare with 99.5% of events being recorded as financially motivated cybercrime.
2. Public administration, including the defence industry, was also heavily targeted, accounting for 12% of all cyber events. 35% of these attacks were financially motivated cybercrime, with 26.7% hacktivism, 26.5% cyber espionage, and 10.5% cyber warfare.
3. Financial services, which comprises finance, insurance, and fintech, was targeted in 8% of all cyber events, with economic gain being the prevailing motivation for over 99% of attacks.

The invasion of Ukraine sparked a flurry of cyber incidents relating to Russia in the early part of this year with a clear spike in cyber espionage, hacktivism, and cyber warfare targeting Russian businesses and individuals. The data shows however that this was short-lived with activity falling off considerably in recent months, most likely because hacktivist groups were not willing or able to sustain their efforts as the conflict continued.

In contrast, cybercrime incidents have continued to grow throughout the year. Despite the media attention received by cyber warfare and hacktivism campaigns, cybercriminals remain by far the biggest threat to businesses, particularly in healthcare, public services and financial services, which are consistently the sectors most frequently targeted.

About the data

Data is collated and expanded on Passeri’s personal blog, Hackmageddon.com. The events analysed are gathered from OSINT sources, such as infosec blogs or news outlets, and are selected based on the impact (for example the profile of the target, the breadth and sophistication of the operation, and the financial loss or the number of leaked records in case of cybercrime events). Specific data is available on request from Netskope.