India is the third-worst affected country by ransomware attacks: Report

Microsoft recently disclosed vulnerabilities in the Microsoft Exchange servers. Now, a new report says that there has been a global surge in the number of ransomware attacks since the company disclosed the vulnerabilities.

According to a report by CheckPoint Research, there has been a 9% monthly increase in organisations affected by ransomware attacks since the beginning of 2021. This uptick includes a 57% increase in organisations affected by ransomware in the past 6 months. The report also says that in the last week alone, the number of attacks involving Exchange Server vulnerabilities has tripled. The research organisation has seen over 50,000 attack attempts seen globally in the past week. 3,868 organisations have been affected globally.

The report also says that the government and military remain the most affected industry by the ransomware attacks with a total of 18% attacks. This was followed by manufacturing with 11% of the total attacks, banking and financial services with 8% of the total attacks, healthcare with 6% of the total attacks and education and research with 4% of the total attacks.

As far as countries that remain most affected by the ransomware attacks are concerned, CPR says that the US remains the most affected country with 12% of the total attacks being directed towards it. It was followed by Israel and India at second and third spots with a total of 8% and 7% attacks respectively being directed towards it. Japan, on the other hand, remained the fourth most affected country with 6% of the total attacks while Canada, Spain, Mexico, the United Kingdom, China and Portugal saw 2% attacks each.

Additionally, the report noted that WannaCry ransomware that made its debut four years ago is back in action. Since the beginning of the year, the number of organisations affected by WannaCry globally has increased by 53%. CPR found that there are 40 times more affected organisations in March 2021 when compared to October 2020. EternalBlue exploit was used to propagate the ransomware. It was also used in the ransomware attack almost four years ago and patches for it have been available ever since.