Italy is the third country in the world and the first in Europe most affected by malware. The data emerges from “Stepping ahead of risk”, the Trend Micro Research report on cyber threats that hit during the first half of 2023. The study confirms once again that Italy is among the countries preferred by cybercriminals, as a target to launch an attack.
Italy: all the numbers for the first half of 2023
Malware – Italy confirms itself as the third most affected country in the world and the first in Europe, with a total of 174,608,112 malware intercepted. These are the top five positions: United States (417,545,421), Japan (355,248,073), Italy (174,608,112), India (120,426,491), Brazil (96,908,591) Macro Malware – Italy is fourth Most affected country in the world, with 5,180 attacks. On the podium were Japan (28,816), the United States (10,485) and Turkey (5,529). The email threats that hit Italy in the first half of 2023 were 119,048,776. The visits to malicious sites were 5,470,479. The malicious sites hosted in Italy and blocked were 68,334 Malicious apps – The number of malicious apps downloaded in the first half of 2023 was 78,724,698 Online Banking – The unique online banking malware intercepted were 1,804
Globally, in the first half of 2023, the rapid expansion of generative artificial intelligence tools has allowed cybercriminals to use new tools such as WormGPT and FraudGPT and to organize new scams, such as virtual kidnappings. Ransomware attacks also remain an important phenomenon and are proving to be increasingly sophisticated. Several cybercriminal groups have also joined forces, to maximize the results of their malicious activities.
The use of artificial intelligence allows cybercriminals to carry out more elaborate attacks and poses a new set of challenges. The good news is that the same technology can also be used by security teams to work more effectively.
Globally, Trend Micro blocked a total of 85 billion threats (85,629,564,910) in the first half of 2023. Around 37 billion threats arrived via email.
The full report is available at this link