It has been reported that LockBit has claimed ransomware attacks on California’s Dept. of Finance, a purported 76 gigabytes worth!

As 2022 draws to a close, ransomware attacks are ramping up. November represented the second busiest month of the year, with a 180% increase over 2021, and when it comes to the criminal gangs, LockBit took the top spot with a 33% increase in attacks.

Unfortunately, the attack on the California Department of Finance comes as no surprise, as government consistently remains in the top 3 targeted sectors, alongside education and healthcare. These under-resourced, data rich public sector organizations represent high value low hanging fruit for attackers.

2022 has also seen a dramatic increase in data exfiltration, with hackers moving away from encryption-based attacks. Virtually all new attacks focus on data exfiltration to extract valuable data for extortion, disruption, espionage and cyber warfare. As long as organisations continue to rely on existing perimeter defense technologies, we’ll continue to read about these attacks in 2023.