Where Cyberattacks Come From – It’s Not Just Russia and China

In the previous year, high-profile cyber attacks from China and Russia have incited the United States and western allies to take swift action to encounter the escalating events.

The Microsoft Exchange case, SolarWinds spyware access, and other ransomware attacks by criminal mobs dominate headlines compelling state-led responses for cybersecurity.

However, it’s not always China or Russia playing adversarial roles in the online realm. Smaller malicious groups from Iran, India, Latin America, Israel, and Belarus also have a role to play in digital espionage and disruptive hacking.

In addition, several other independent threat actors and hacktivist groups of unknown origin also engage in harmful activities for secretive purposes.

What are the Most Common Cyberattacks?

While there are many different types of cyberattacks, Specops highlights the four most commonly used for significant cyber-crimes:

• SQL injection Attack. SQL is essentially the code that is used to convey within a database. In a Structured Query Language injection attack, an unauthorized user writes malicious SQL code, inserting it into the victim’s database to access personal information
• Phishing Attack. This is when a bad actor poses as an authentic institution and correspondences with a victim to get their details such as home address, login credentials, credit card information, etc.
• Man-In-The-Middle. This form of cyber-attack occurs when a malicious actor hacks into a channel of communication between two people and spies on their digital exchanges.
• Denial of Service Attack. This includes flooding the system of the victim with traffic till their network is not accessible. The hackers don’t gain any useful information from this attack style

Significant Cyber Attacks from 2006-2020 – By Country

Committing a cyber-crime can result in severe punishments for the perpetrators. For example, in the United States, cyber-criminals can get up to 20 years in prison to hack into a government institution if it compromises national security.

Yet, regardless of the consequences, a cyber-criminal continues to wreak havoc around the world. However, some countries may seem to be targeted more than others.

The United States comes at the first position, with 156 cyberattacks recorded. That is an average of 11 significant attacks annually, and this is more than the score Russia has had in 14 years.

One of the other examples is Facebook when it disrupted hacking groups in Syria and Pakistan. David Agranovich, global threat disruption director of Facebook, and Mike Dvilyanski, cyberespionage team lead, exchanged details on the firm’s actions against four different groups of hackers in Syria and Pakistan over the previous several months.

Facebook disabled the accounts, blocked their domains, shared information with business peers, law enforcement, and security researchers, and warned the people they deemed the hackers targeted.

Wrapping Up

Cyber intelligence isn’t a new concept. However, the evolution of campaigns from different places like the Middle East, Vietnam, Pakistan, and more means that there are possibly more attacks in the future, with everyone using their techniques to lure and trick to achieve their intended targets.

And with new tools and techniques becoming available to malicious actors across the globe – it is only going to get easier for smaller players to get a part of the cyber pie.

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