Researchers from BAE Systems Applied Intelligence polled over 900 financial institutions in the U.S. and the U.K. and found that 56% of the firms experienced an increase in financial losses at an average of $720,000 because of fraud-related activities, according to ITProPortal.
The report also found a 26% drop in budgets within cybercrime, fraud, IT security and risk departments, and 40% of IT security teams had to reduce their budgets for important IT security.
“Fraudsters and cybercriminals seek to exploit fear, uncertainty and change, and the pandemic has offered them new opportunities to probe for weaknesses they can monetise and new ways to disguise their activity,” said Adrian Nish, BAE Systems Applied Intelligence's head of Cyber. He added that threat actors “are building increasingly advanced capabilities to target core banking systems and becoming more aggressive, harming victims’ ability to respond to attacks. Online criminals have reacted fast, adapting their approach to hunt out remote working security gaps and prey on the vulnerable.”
The report also found a 26% drop in budgets within cybercrime, fraud, IT security and risk departments, and 40% of IT security teams had to reduce their budgets for important IT security.
“Fraudsters and cybercriminals seek to exploit fear, uncertainty and change, and the pandemic has offered them new opportunities to probe for weaknesses they can monetise and new ways to disguise their activity,” said Adrian Nish, BAE Systems Applied Intelligence's head of Cyber. He added that threat actors “are building increasingly advanced capabilities to target core banking systems and becoming more aggressive, harming victims’ ability to respond to attacks. Online criminals have reacted fast, adapting their approach to hunt out remote working security gaps and prey on the vulnerable.”
