Articles about extortion

New research looking at high pressure extortion scams reveals that Gen Z is being particularly impacted by AI-powered threats. All mobile users are at risk, however, with one in three having been targeted by an extortion scam, often threatening to expose pictures or browsing history, and nearly one in five falling victim.

The research from Malwarebytes shows a distinct target profile for extortion. 69 percent of victims and 64 percent of targets are Gen Z or Millennial (compared 52 percent of victims and 40 percent of targets of other types of scams). 65 percent of victims and 60 percent of targets are male (vs. 48 percent/45 percent)

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A new report from Semperis, based on a study of almost 1,500 organizations globally, shows that hackers are stepping up threat levels and ransomware is still a global epidemic.

In 40 percent of attacks threat actors threatened to physically harm executives at organizations that declined to pay a ransom demand. US-based companies experienced physical threats 46 percent of the time, while 44 percent of German firms experienced similar forms of intimidation.

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The cyber extortion threat landscape continues to evolve quickly and the past 12 months have seen the number of victims globally increasing by 46 percent, marking the highest numbers ever recorded.

A new report from Orange Cyberdefense shows large enterprises were the victim in the majority of attacks (40 percent), with those employing more than 10,000 people seeing a steady increase.

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After a decrease of eight percent in cyber extortion (Cy-X) victims in 2022, the data for the first quarter of this year shows the largest volumes to date.

The latest Cy-Xplorer 2023 report from Orange Cyberdefense shows businesses in 96 different countries were impacted by Cy-X in 2022. Since 2020 Orange Cyberdefense has recorded victims in over 70 percent of all countries worldwide.

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