A SonicWall report has attested that cryptojacking has seen a massive surge of over 399% globally in the last 1 year.
According to the report, the number of cryptojacking attacks has reached 332 million hits in the first half of 2023. The report suggests that these bad actors are seeking new discrete approaches to siphon customers’ funds especially, due to increased law enforcement activity and heavy sanctions on the old methods like Ponzi schemes or more regular hacks.
Cybercriminals Adopt New Approach
Cybercriminals have suddenly taken to other lower-risk activities like cryptojacking, IoT malware and encrypted threats in a bid to shun the spotlight.
These actors remotely hack servers and other devices, coercing them to perform unauthorized mining of cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin (BTC). SonicWall Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Bob VanKirk said,
“The seemingly endless digital assault on enterprises, governments and global citizens is intensifying, and the threat landscape continues to expand. Threat actors are relentless, and our data indicate they are more opportunistic than ever, targeting schools, state and local governments, and retail organizations at unprecedented rates.”
Cryptojacking Surge as Ransomware Attacks Dip
Ransomware attacks were previously the approach of interest for cybercriminals, where they get to announce their presence and introduce themselves.
However, with these bad actors seeking to remain undiscovered, the rate of ransomware has shown signs of a possible decrease. At the same time, while ransomware’s year-to-year trend line has shown a downtrend, its month-on-month analysis shows a second quarter 74% higher than the first.
It seems that victims of such attacks are no longer threatened by the request to pay ransom.
Victim organizations are refusing to pay the attackers, hence, ransomware payments have been on a decline. To confirm this decline, an analysis by Chainalysis revealed that the total ransomware revenue for 2022 plummeted by approximately 40.3% from its figure the previous year. Precisely, the figure dropped from a high of $765.6 million in 2021 to at least $456.8 million in 2022.
Just as SonicWall EMEA vice president Spencer Starkey puts it, cryptojacking “has become the new modus operandi for hackers, as organizations increasingly refuse to pay ransoms,” and its growing popularity is causing an increased accumulation of BTC by criminals and nation-states.
