Websense Security Labs 2014 Threat Report Uncovers Cyber-Attack Trends

Our annual threat report is an opportunity for Websense Security Labs researchers to analyze the previous year-while providing security professionals with insight they can use to effectively adapt their future security strategies. Visit www.websense.com/2014threatreport to download our report, which uncovers the latest shift in complex attack trends, threat ecosystem evolution and cyber-attack motivations. It's true what they say: the only thing constant in the cybersecurity profession is change.

Our findings document how the infrastructure of an attack campaign is constantly developed, enhanced and reused throughout the entire threat lifecycle. To avoid detection when reusing components in subsequent attacks, criminals are increasingly taking an approach that involves modification and modulation of existing attack tools. This report examines data from January 1 to December 31, 2013.

Key Websense Security Labs 2014 Threat Report findings include:

• 85 percent of malicious links used in web or email attacks were located on compromised legitimate websites
• 3.3 percent of all spam contained malicious links and other malicious content
• Websense technologies protected customers from more than 1 billion lure events
• The average number of website redirects used per attack in 2013 was 4
• The maximum number of redirects used in a fully documented attack was 20
• 1.8 billion malicious redirect events were stopped by Websense
• Websites classified as Business and Economy, Information Technology, Shopping and Travel made the top 10 list of compromised redirect destination categories
• The Magnitude and Neutrino Exploit Kits experienced the largest surge in adoption following the arrest of Blackhole's creator
• Websense protected customers from approximately 67 million exploit kit events
• 64 million dropper file events were detected and blocked using Websense real-time security and TRITON ThreatScope
• 30 percent of malicious executable files sampled included custom encryption of command and control communication or data exfiltration
• More than 1.1 billion call home events were prevented by Websense gateways

Keeping up with cybercriminals is no easy task. My global team works 24/7 to ensure organizations are safe from insider threats, the latest zero day, morphed exploit kits and advanced malware creation. Have any questions about the Websense Security Labs 2014 Threat Report? Feel free to comment and let's discuss.