Suppose 2021 has been a year that has put the cybersecurity of companies, public organizations, and institutions to the test for next year. In that case, the experts agree that these cyber threats will continue to increase. In the following lines, we will see the threats to cybersecurity in 2022 that organizations will face.

What Are The Main Threats To Cybersecurity For Companies In 2022?

The digitalization of companies and administration, remote work and hybrid environments, a greater use of IoT (Internet of Things) devices, the dependence on mobile devices and the 24/7 connection to the Internet or the use of more digital services are some of the elements that will mean that by 2022 the cybersecurity threats not only continue to occur but also increase in number and intensity.

Although no one will be completely safe from threats to computer security (unless one decides to disconnect from the Internet completely), the companies and public administrations are most exposed to this type of attack and those that will suffer the most from its consequences. Economic and reputational.

Supply Chain Attacks

In 2021 we already saw some of the most notorious supply chain attacks, such as those suffered by SolarWinds vendors Codecov and Kaseya. The danger of these attacks lies in the fact that they affect the service provider company and those that depend on them, thus spreading the attack throughout the chain and affecting countless companies, public entities, and individuals.

These sophisticated and potentially cause severe damage to innumerable victims. These attacks could lead (or should) governments to create much stricter and demanding regulatory frameworks with the security measures of companies to protect vulnerable networks and avoid the failure or interruption of essential services.

Security Breaches

Digitization, especially that which had to be done quickly and urgently when lockdowns were imposed by Covid-19 and the need to telework to continue operating, have increased to security breaches. This leads companies and administrations to invest more money in preventing these breaches and recovery protocols, including the need to pay a ransom if they have been victims of ransomware and face possible administrative sanctions.

Ransomware Rise

Speaking of ransomware attacks, they have already featured in many of the news about computer attacks during 2021, and the trend, according to experts, is that this type of attack continues to increase. They have become a lucrative source of income for various groups of cybercriminals since they get money in exchange for unlocking encrypted systems and for not publishing the information that they have managed to exfiltrate during the attack processor for selling it on the Internet—dark web.

In addition, ransomware has become one of the products offered on the dark web as MaaS (malware as a service or malware as a service), which means that cybercriminals with less technical knowledge can also use this type of attack.

Cyber Cold War

Tensions seem to grow between different countries in the international arena, and this is also reflected in the digital plane; the so-called “cyber cold war” appears to be intensifying at the same time, and that leads experts, by 2022, to predict that there will be an increase in cyber attacks sponsored by some States to damage key or critical infrastructure of other governments, such as gas pipelines, pipelines, and power plants.

Fake News

Fake news (false news or disinformation) is not precisely a cybersecurity threat. Still, cybercriminals do take advantage of it to carry out other types of attacks, especially phishing and other scams related to the theft of data credentials.

An example of this is the disinformation surrounding Covid-19 and vaccines and the sale of false Covid or vaccination certificates on the dark web, some of them accompanied by malware to be installed on the devices of their buyers.

Deepfake

Deepfakes, thanks to the development of the technology that makes them possible, are increasingly sophisticated and challenging to detect, which means that cyberattacks based on them will become more common. We already have examples of this in 2021, with company workers who were deceived by a telephone deepfake. Using the voice of a manager or superior, the cybercriminal pretended to be that person to request money transfers.

Deep Fakes also can influence people through social media by damaging the image and reputation of their victims.

cryptocurrency Target

Cryptocurrencies and other types of crypto assets, such as NFTs, are becoming more and more popular and reaching more people who decide to invest in them. This has caused cybercriminals to focus on them and design attacks to steal crypto assets from exchanges and user wallets. One of these attacks is carried out using free NFTs used as an entry vector to steal users’ wallets by taking advantage of security flaws or vulnerabilities.

Container Vulnerabilities

Vulnerabilities, especially those present in containers and cloud services, are another target for cybersecurity threats in 2022. More and more companies and public entities depend on so-called cloud services, and, many times, these are left out of control. Organization’s information security strategy. Cybercriminals know this and have started attacking and exploiting these sites and services’ vulnerabilities.

Hybrid Environments And Mobility

Remote work, both in its full format and in its hybrid format, has brought with it new weak points, especially related to attacks on remote desktop applications and mobile devices, so this trend is expected to continue to rise by 2022.

In this case, the weak point is the employee who does not apply or does not follow the instructions and security measures implemented by the company and can leave the door open to all kinds of attacks whose objective is to penetrate the company’s internal network to achieve their targets, often related to ransomware attacks or exfiltration of sensitive information.

Malicious Use Of Defense Tools

Defense tools were designed to test an entity’s cybersecurity measures. However, cybercriminals also exploit them to their advantage and use them to launch much more efficient cyberattacks. It is a trend that has been increasing throughout 2021, and it seems that it will continue to grow in 2022 since it allows you to customize these tools to penetrate the defenses of entities “more easily.”

Other threats that we have seen throughout this article are mainly used to launch ransomware attacks and exfiltrate data.

These are the predictions of cybersecurity threats in 2022, a year in which all experts agree that cyberattacks will continue to increase and that the tools and technologies to carry them out will become more sophisticated. It is up to the organizations and their CISO and RSI (responsible for information security) to create strategies and implement security measures that prevent these threats, reduce their impact, and train and raise awareness among the entire workforce of following the security protocols implemented.

Also Read: Application Security Checklist: 11 Best Practices