Our colleagues at PandaLabs have been making their predictions about what will be happening in the world of IT security in 2015. Do you want to know what we will be up against next year?

Security forecast for 2015

CryptoLocker

This type of malware has been in the spotlight in 2014, and these attacks are set to increase in 2015.

CryptoLocker operates in straightforward fashion: Once it gets into a computer, it encrypts all types of documents that could be valuable to the user (spreadsheets, documents, databases, photos, etc.) and blackmails the victim into paying a ransom to recover the files.

Payment is always demanded in bitcoins, so that it cannot be traced by the police, making this type of attack very attractive to cyber-criminals, as many users decide to pay in order to recover the hijacked information.

Targeted attacks

A small percentage of the millions of new malware strains that appear every month are specifically created to attack previously defined targets. These attacks, known as targeted attacks, are becoming more common and will be highly significant during 2015.

One of the greatest risks to tackle is that many companies are unaware that they could be the target of such attacks and therefore do not have appropriate measures for detecting or stopping them, or at least for detecting any anomaly and mitigating any damage as soon as possible.

Point-of-sale terminals

In 2014 we have seen an increase in attacks on the POS terminals used by all stores to accept and process customer payments.

Cyber-criminals are attacking these terminals and consequently stealing the credit card details of customers. As a result, an activity that users did not think of as a risk, such as paying at a supermarket, gas station, clothes store, etc., is starting to pose a potential threat to which hundreds of millions of people around the world have already fallen victim.

APTs

APTs (Advanced Persistent Threats) are a type of targeted attack aimed at companies or strategic institutions. Behind these attacks are usually countries that invest huge sums of money in ensuring that the targeted attack goes undetected for a long time.

Although we will not see mass APT attacks in 2015, new cases will be discovered that will have probably been around for years but will only just start coming to light.

Internet of Things

The number of Internet-enabled devices is increasing dramatically, and we are not just referring to computers or cell phones but other devices.

From IP cameras to printers, all of these ‘new’ devices that form part of the Internet share a feature that makes them a highly vulnerable target for cyber-criminals: They are devices that users do not pay much attention to and consequently, for example, they are rarely updated. As a result, as soon as a security flaw is found in the software on any one of these, compromising the device will be child’s play for any cyber-criminal. To make matters worse, these devices are connected to internal networks, home or corporate, making them ideal entry points for carrying out all types of wider attacks.

Smartphones

Smartphone attacks, or more specifically attacks on devices running Android, are going to reach new heights. Not only will the attacks increase but so will their complexity, with a single goal: to steal passwords.

We store a growing amount of data on our smartphones and cyber-criminals are going to try to get it at any cost.

Although malware on cell phones was somewhat anecdotal a couple of years ago, more malware for Android has appeared in 2014 than all of the malware targeting any mobile device ever.

It seems that in 2015 these threats will skyrocket, and the number of victims will also increase.Therefore it will be essential to use antivirus products for these devices.

You can download the full report here.

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