Cyber Defense eMagazine February Edition for 2023

SMBs Are More Frequent Targets of Cyber-Attacks.
Cybercriminals don’t discriminate by size. Like larger organizations, SMBs have valuable data and
financial resources that bad actors are after, and they far outnumber large organizations. They also don’t
always have the luxury of an IT department or dedicated cybersecurity resources, making them prime
targets for costly ransomware, bots, and phishing attacks.
Typically, small business owners have one primary focus: growing their businesses. That often means
that security and IT in general tend to be underserved functions for many small businesses due to limited
staffing and skills. This is a vulnerability that bad actors take advantage of, unfortunately.
These vulnerabilities explain why more than half of SMBs (58%) have suffered at least one security
incident, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center’s 2021 Business Aftermath Report. Another
report from RiskRecon found that data breaches at small companies in 2020 and 2021 increased by
152% compared to the two prior years.
We've found that up to 65% of Comcast Business SecurityEdge customers experienced blocked
attacks from July 2021 to June 2022, with up to 55% experiencing a botnet attack and nearly 50%
experiencing malware and phishing attacks.
Profit is a Big Motivator for Cyber-Attacks.
Hackers make money by selling stolen credentials, customer data, financial information, and intellectual
property on the dark web. So, it’s not surprising that websites owned by financial services and high-tech
organizations are prime targets for phishing attacks.
These attacks, which prey on vulnerable situations or events to gain access to credentials and more, are
one of the most common forms of cybercrime and one of the biggest threats to small businesses today.
In fact, internet traffic shows financial and high-tech SMB organizations were the most targeted by
phishing scams, at 41% and 36%, respectively.
But it’s not just phishing attacks that small business owners need to worry about these days. Malware
and ransomware are other threats unsuspecting users face. According to the Identity Theft Resource
Center, 44% of SMBs paid $250,000 to $400,000 for recovery costs of an attack, and 16% of SMBs paid
up to $1 million. Ransomware attacks are one of the most common forms of attacks experienced by
SMBs.
With 1 in 6 firms attacked in the past year saying they almost went under, the consequences of a
cyberattack can be long-lasting and costly for SMBs.
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