Biggest CS Incidents of 2021

2021 is proving to be a record-breaking year for cybersecurity-related incidents and breaches. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, online crime is up 600%. The average global cost of a breach is 3.86 million, and 95% of breaches are the result of human error.

Here are just a couple of the biggest incidents of 2021.

Facebook: In April 2021, Facebook discovered an incident that involved the breach of 533 million Facebook user records from 106 different countries. The personal information leaked included birthday, full name, location, relationship status, and all Facebook member’s bios.

Microsoft: In March of this year, Microsoft reported that it was a victim of an online attack from the Chinese hacking group called Hafnium. Over 30,000 organizations across the United States including local governments and businesses were targeted in the attack.

Acer: Acer suffered one of the most expensive ransomware attacks of the year when a malicious hacker group known as REvil gained access to the back-office network of Acer through a Microsoft vulnerability. The data leakage included financial spreadsheets, bank balances, and bank communications. The hacker group set a ransom of $50 million which is the highest record of ransomware to date.

Colonial Pipeline: Earlier this year, a hacker group compromised the systems of the Colonial Pipeline and locked the real-time information as well as 100 gigabytes of raw information and demanded a ransom. The entire system was offline for a few days to stop operational systems, and it caused a huge loss for the US oil and gas pipeline market because the pipeline carries around 2.5 million barrels of diesel, petrol, and jet fuel each day from the Gulf Coast to the eastern seaboard.

LinkedIn: In April 2021, LinkedIn faced a massive breach, and 500 million active users accounts were compromised. The sensitive information included email addresses, phone numbers, names, gender, and other social media accounts connected to the platform.

Don’t let your business become a statistic or a headline. Contact an IT support company to schedule an in-depth look at your current security practices and let us help you find ways to better protect your organization.