There has been a tenfold increase in Locky ransomware attacks on companies in Asia Pacific according to Check Point, a cyber security firm.
Check Point revealed that the number of attacks on companies in Asia Pacific increased tenfold from 160 attacks in April to 1667 attacks in July 2016. Locky is a ransomware, discovered earlier this year, which encrypts files on an infected system and then demands payment from companies for the encrypted files in Bitcoins.
“There has been a significant increase in cyber-attacks in Asia Pacific and this will only continue to rise. The challenge for organisations is that the authors of these malwares continue to develop variants in attempts to evade detection.” said Rami Ben Efraim, Head of Government and Defence sectors from Check Point, speaking at Cybertech Singapore, a cyber security and cyber solutions conference which took place from 6-7th September at Marina Bay Sands convention centre in Singapore.
Over 1000 cyber industry leaders, academic and government representatives and cyber start-up companies gathered at Cybertech Singapore over the two day conference and exhibition to discuss the major cybersecurity threats facing companies, governments and critical infrastructure across Asia and the solutions available to tackle these threats.
Key topics discussed at the event included cyber trends in aviation, big data and intelligence, advanced cyber solutions for the IOT era and human resources within the cyber industry.