Over the past several months, financial firms are seeing an uptick in ransomware attacks. In fact, IT security professionals in the financial industry have noted that ransomware attacks have not only become more common but have also become more sophisticated. Cybersecurity professionals are seeing a new wave of threats that banks and investment firms are struggling to prevent. Over the past two years, financial firms are seeing more ransomware attacks that utilize outside service providers which are also known as ransomware-as-a-service. Firms are also seeing variants that have chosen different attack vectors, meaning they are now attacking other areas of firms such as corporate phone systems. According to Sophos’ The State of Ransomware in Financial Services 2022, 55% of financial service firms were victims of at least one attack in 2021, up from 34% in the previous year. The bigger issue for banks and other financial firms though is not just the number of ransomware threats, but their increasing sophistication.

Finsum:Financial firms are not only seeing an increase in ransomware threats, but the sophistication of attacks has also increased.