{"id":3342,"date":"2024-04-30T23:01:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T04:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/?p=80302"},"modified":"2024-04-30T23:01:00","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T04:01:00","slug":"exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ddi.mohflo.net\/index.php\/2024\/04\/30\/exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Exploitation of vulnerabilities almost tripled as a source of data breaches last year"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><head> <meta charset=\"UTF-8\"> <meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width, initial-scale=1\"> <meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-image-preview:large, max-snippet:-1, max-video-preview:-1\"> <!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v21.7 (Yoast SEO v21.7) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ --> <title>Exploitation of vulnerabilities almost tripled as a source of data breaches last year | CyberScoop<\/title> <meta name=\"description\" content=\"Verizon\u2019s annual data breach report identified the MOVEit hack as the \u201cposter child\u201d of the phenomenon.\"> <link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/verizon-data-breach-report-vulnerabilities-moveit-hack\/\"> <meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\"> <meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\"> <meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Exploitation of vulnerabilities almost tripled as a source of data breaches last year\"> <meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Verizon\u2019s annual data breach report identified the MOVEit hack as the \u201cposter child\u201d of the phenomenon.\"> <meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/verizon-data-breach-report-vulnerabilities-moveit-hack\/\"> <meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"CyberScoop\"> <meta property=\"article:published_time\" 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<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p> Verizon\u2019s annual data breach report identified the MOVEit hack as the \u201cposter child\u201d of the phenomenon. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"single-article__cover-wrap\">\n<figure class=\"single-article__cover\"> <img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" fetchpriority=\"high\" width=\"640\" height=\"426\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ddi.mohflo.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year.jpg?resize=640%2C426&#038;ssl=1\" class=\"single-article__cover-image wp-post-image\" alt decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ddi.mohflo.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year-2.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/ddi.mohflo.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year-2.jpg?resize=300,200 300w, 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(Photo by Kena Betancur\/VIEWpress) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"single-article__content\">\n<div class=\"single-article__content-inner has-drop-cap\"> <html readability=\"25.475746268657\"><body readability=\"51.576576576577\"><\/p>\n<p>Attacks that relied on the exploitation of vulnerabilities as their key path to a breach leaped a remarkable 180% last year compared to the year before, driven in large measure by <a href=\"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/schnieder-electric-siemens-energy-moveit-cl0p\/\">the sweeping MOVEit hack<\/a>, according to the annual Verizon data breach report released Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re attributing that increase to the use of zero-day vulnerabilities by ransomware actors,\u201d said Alex Pinto, who leads the Verizon team that wrote the report, referring to a kind of vulnerability that had been previously unknown. \u201cThe poster child of that, the thing that everybody was talking about last year, was the MoveIt vulnerability.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Verizon was able to identify 1,567 breach notifications that related to the MOVEit file transfer service. By some estimates, it was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wired.com\/story\/moveit-breach-victims\/\">the biggest attack last year<\/a> and arguably <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/politics\/2023\/09\/29\/ransomware-gang-innovates-putting-pressure-victims-also-exposing-itself\/\">the biggest ransomware attack campaign ever<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Its impact stands in stark contrast to the kind of impact Verizon expected in last year\u2019s report from the log4j vulnerability, which spawned dire warnings at the time but ended up having a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/politics\/2023\/06\/06\/new-report-scrutinizes-ransomware-human-failings-cyber-log4j-more\/\">somewhat limited effect<\/a>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"ad ad--inline_1 \">\n<div class=\"ad__inner\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Advertisement<\/span> <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>A possible explanation for the difference is that log4j is ubiquitous enough to have marshaled a widespread effort to counter the vulnerability ranging from mature companies on down, whereas with MOVEit, \u201cI don\u2019t believe that was over-represented on very mature companies,\u201d said Pinto, associate director of threat intelligence at Verizon Business. Notably, the education sector \u2014 viewed as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.route-fifty.com\/cybersecurity\/2024\/03\/schools-are-vulnerable-breaches-and-hackers-know-it\/395116\/\">one of the least-equipped<\/a> to fend off cyberattacks \u2014 was the sector most impacted.<\/p>\n<p>That wasn\u2019t the only conclusion of the annual encyclopedic Verizon Data Breach Report, which analyzed more than 10,000 breaches and more than 30,000 security incidents from an array of sources and collaborators. The report analyzes everything from how insider threats and user errors drive breaches to attacks broken down industry by industry.<\/p>\n<p>One area that <a href=\"https:\/\/cyberscoop.com\/generative-ai-chatbots-cybersecurity\/\">fell flat<\/a> was artificial intelligence\u2019s influence on data breaches.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did keep an eye out for any indications of the use of the emerging field of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in attacks and the potential effects of those technologies, but nothing materialized in the incident data we collected globally,\u201d the report states. That\u2019s perhaps due to the fact that many existing attack methods \u201cdon\u2019t need to be more sophisticated to be successful against their targets,\u201d the report suggests.<\/p>\n<p><\/body> <\/p>\n<footer class=\"single-article__footer\" readability=\"3.9207920792079\">\n<div class=\"author-card\" readability=\"14\">\n<div class=\"author-card__avatar\">\n<figure class=\"author-card__image-wrap\"> <img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"author-card__image\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ddi.mohflo.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/exploitation-of-vulnerabilities-almost-tripled-as-a-source-of-data-breaches-last-year-1.jpg?w=640&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Elias Groll\"> <\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><h4 class=\"author-card__name\">Written by Elias Groll<\/h4>\n<p> Elias Groll is a senior editor at CyberScoop. He has previously worked as a reporter and editor at Foreign Policy, covering technology and national security, and at the Brookings Institution, where he was the managing editor of TechStream and worked as part of the AI and Emerging Technology Initiative. 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