Cyber Criminal Activity Dominated By Crypto Mining Malware

As the other industries are vulnerable to cyber criminal activity in 2020, just like that the cryptocurrency industry is vulnerable too, according to a Check Point Research’s cybersecurity report that we have in our crypto news today.

In 2019, there was no organization, regardless of its size, that was exempted from cyberattacks. Cyber criminal activity is profitable because it is attractive to people without any morals. Researchers estimated that for 2018, cybercrime attacks made US$1.5 trillion. Bitcoin is strong because of the randomness of the data exchanges within the Bitcoin blockchain, and the utilization of sturdy encryption. In consequence, the blockchain and the data cannot be copied or infiltrated through malware or certain other malicious technology. However, transactions that are made around the blockchain are vulnerable to cyberattacks.

For instance, the Cyber Security Report for 2020, underlines the threat to cloud infrastructures related to crypto-mining attacks.  While the value of cryptos, has fallen in value in 2019, cloud infrastructures are a huge target for crypto mining malevolent campaigns. The definition of crypto mining is software programs and malware components that are programmed to take over the resources of a given computer and utilize them for crypto mining without the permission of the host.

Ransomware poses another threat that developed in a more sophisticated and becoming more targeted in the previous year. In the first part of 2019, in comparison to 2018, there was a 50% growth in attacks by mobile banking malware. According to the report: “27% of all organizations globally were impacted by cyberattacks that involved mobile devices.”

The report gives the description of the malware that concretely exploits Bitcoin over any other crypto. For instance, Command and Control address update mechanism through public Bitcoin lists is included in Glupteba. So Glupteba is utilized to distribute a browser stealer or router exploiter. Also, Cryptoloot is utilized to do online mining of Monero coins when the intruder visits a web page lacking the authorization of the user. Furthermore, Danabo, a banking Trojan that has the target of Windows platform, that are also utilized to steal browser passwords and wallets. The report gives advice:

 “To prevent zero-day attacks, organizations first need incisive, real-time threat intelligence that provides up-to-minute information on the newest attack vectors and hacking techniques. Threat intelligence must cover all attack surfaces, including cloud, mobile, network, endpoint, and IoT, because these vectors are commonplace in an enterprise.”