Cyberattack methods aimed at cloud deployments grew between 27% and 45% from previous year: report

Top cyberattack methods aimed at cloud deployments grew between 27% and 45% over the previous year, while top attacks aimed at on-premises deployments remained relatively flat, according to a report released on Tuesday by Alert Logic, a provider of security-as-a-service for the cloud.

The 2015 Cloud Security Report said that attacks increased by 27% for “brute force” (an attempt to gain access to a system by repeatedly trying different user names and passwords or cryptographic keys until the current combination is found), by 36% for “suspicious activity” (attackers probing systems and networks, searching for potential vulnerabilities that can be exploited to gain access) and by 45% for “app attack” (an attempt to exploit an application to harm, destroy or access the data stored in the application). For on-premises data centres, there was a 3% increase in suspicious activity, 1% for Trojans and 6% for app attacks. [click image below to enlarge]

“Alert Logic attributes this increase in cloud attacks as being driven by the overall strong adoption of cloud computing platforms,” the company said in a press release. “In other words, cyber criminals are logically attempting to break into a growing number of applications being deployed in the cloud.”

Will Semple, vice president of security services for Alert Logic, added that “while cybercriminals are increasingly targeting cloud deployments, on-premises deployments are still being targeted at the same frequency as they always were.”

Alert Logic employed ActiveAnalyics, its big data security analytics engine, to analyze one billion events in the IT environments of more than 3,000 of its customers between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2014 to identify more than 800,000 security incidents. Insights were gleaned from customer environments representing all deployment models – on premises (639), in the cloud (2,387) and hosted, and a vast array of market segments and 16 industries.

“Cyberattacks are on the rise,” the report said. “Companies both large and small are targeted daily by hackers seeking valuable data to monetize in the cyber underground. Recent reports show that 87% of organizations are making use of cloud infrastructure, while analysts predict spending will exceed US$200 billion in 2016.”

Alert Logic’s customer data set included 842,711 incidents over 365 days, or 2,308 actual attacks per day on average. For the financial sector specifically, adding new delivery models – such as website access, mobile banking via apps, SMS/text message banking and numerous email-based services – to their cloud environments “resulted in an increase of attackers attempting to steal financial data – credit card numbers, as well as personal information to fuel financial fraud and insider information to facilitate insider trading.”

Brute force (33%) and app (18%) attacks comprised the majority of the malicious activity within the financial services industry customer base, “signalling a clear determination of attackers to gain access to these organizations’ valuable data. Coupled with reconnaissance activity, 70% of attack types we identified in the financial services industry are focused on either gaining access or obtaining data.”