Here at FireEye, the New Year gives us an
opportunity to look back at 2013 and analyze what happened in cyber
security from a high-level and strategic perspective.
Let’s start with Asia. Cyber attacks against government websites in Southeast Asia and Australia made the front-page news, reminding security professionals that cyber threats are both a global and a regional issue.
While attention-seeking hackers are trying to attract as much press as possible, organized and resourceful cyber criminals and nation-state threat actors are capable of more advanced – and stealthy – attacks. Motivated by economic and political aims, some of the most advanced cyber attacks are designed to steal information (or, like Stuxnet, sabotage critical infrastructure) and evade detection. Therefore, this class of attacks can often go unnoticed for long periods of time.
Advanced Attacks in Asia: 2013
In our research at FireEye Labs, the Asia Pacific as a region is two times more likely to be targeted by advanced cyber attacks than the world as a whole.
Based on our data, here is a list of the top 10 most targeted countries in Asia during the past year. This data represents only those attackers that we regard as “advanced persistent threats” (APT) or targeted attacks.
Let’s start with Asia. Cyber attacks against government websites in Southeast Asia and Australia made the front-page news, reminding security professionals that cyber threats are both a global and a regional issue.
While attention-seeking hackers are trying to attract as much press as possible, organized and resourceful cyber criminals and nation-state threat actors are capable of more advanced – and stealthy – attacks. Motivated by economic and political aims, some of the most advanced cyber attacks are designed to steal information (or, like Stuxnet, sabotage critical infrastructure) and evade detection. Therefore, this class of attacks can often go unnoticed for long periods of time.
Advanced Attacks in Asia: 2013
In our research at FireEye Labs, the Asia Pacific as a region is two times more likely to be targeted by advanced cyber attacks than the world as a whole.
Based on our data, here is a list of the top 10 most targeted countries in Asia during the past year. This data represents only those attackers that we regard as “advanced persistent threats” (APT) or targeted attacks.
- South Korea
- Japan
- Taiwan
- Thailand
- Hong Kong
- Philippines
- India
- Australia
- Pakistan
- Singapore
Figure 1: APT Heat Map in Asia Pacific. The darker the hue, the higher the number of attacks we found.
