UK Businesses Targeted by Cyber Attacks Every 1 Minute in Q1 2023

Businesses across the UK faced an alarming rate of cyber attacks during the first quarter of 2023, with an average of one attack every minute, as revealed by a recent report from Beaming, who have been monitoring malicious web activity since 2016. The company’s analysis of malicious web traffic during this period showed that businesses experienced an average of 170,508 attempts to breach their online systems. Despite the high numbers, the level of cyber attack activity between January and March was two per cent lower than the busiest quarter on record, which occurred between October and December of 2022.

Cyber Security Investment is Essential for UK Businesses

The study identified 307,385 IP addresses that were used to launch cyber attacks on UK businesses during the first quarter of 2023. A significant 25% of these addresses (75,324) were traced back to China, with other countries, including India, USA, Taiwan, and Brazil, also identified as major sources of cyber attacks. One2Call specialise in providing industry leading cyber security services for businesses of any size across the UK, this report emphasises the need for UK businesses to invest in a robust cyber security solution to protect themselves from the ever evolving cyber security threat landscape. Our FREE Cyber Security Self Assessment can assist UK businesses in understanding if their business is protected in the key areas of a complete cyber security solution.

What are some of the key areas of a robust Cyber Security Solution?

• Active Email Threat Protection: Secure your email from Phishing, Impersonation and Targeted Attacks, Active Email Threat protection monitors all of your emails including, checking links, files and even email language to ensure your business is protected from the latest threats.
• Endpoint Detection & Response: Traditional Signature Based Anti-Virus only protects from 25-40% of malware, EDR monitors your endpoints in real time for zero day threats and unusual or malicious activity that goes undetected by anti-virus.
• Strong Passwords & Password Policies: A 7 character password that has Upper and Lower case Letters and Numbers takes less than a minute to crack, a 10 character password containing Upper and Lower case Letters, Special Characters and Numbers takes 5 months to crack. A strong business password policy with minimum character length and requirements is vital for your account security.
• Multi-Factor Authentication: If your business account details are leaked or cracked, multi-factor authentication can protect your accounts from being accessed, MFA adds an extra layer of account security by providing you with a secondary one time code or authentication to provide access to your accounts.
• Dark Web Monitoring: The Dark Web is a dangerous place, every day personal and private information is leaked or sold on the dark web by malicious individuals. Dark web monitoring scours this data to ensure that your business account details have not been linked, providing us and you with alerts so that we can work together to protect your accounts from potential threats.
• Firewall Protection: Protect your business from targeted attacks with a firewall, providing all the security rules to protect your network from unauthorised access. However, the working environment is evolving and not all of your employees may be at the office. With solutions such as Secure Access Service Edge (SASE), your firewall is in the cloud, protecting all of your business devices regardless of where they are in the world.
• 3, 2, 1 Backup: If your business was targeted in a ransomware attack, or suffered some a hardware failure or natural disaster, could you carry on working or recover? The 3, 2, 1 Backup solution ensures that there are always 3 copies of your business data (with one being off site). We also provide Cloud Storage Backup Solutions and Cloud to Cloud Backup Solutions to ensure that all of your essential data is safe, secure and restorable.
• And more, including Security Awareness Training, Encryption, Managed Computer & Security Updates, Web Gateway Security and Mobile Device Management & Security.

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