Microsoft blocked over 13 billion malicious and suspicious mails in 2019

A few days ago, Microsoft released a security report that used its advantages in desktop, server, enterprise, and cloud ecosystems. The report includes data from July 2019 to June 2020, summarizes the biggest threats companies face today in the face of cybercrime and hacker attacks.

In terms of cybercrime, Microsoft said that it blocked 13 billion malicious and suspicious emails in 2019, including more than 1 billion emails that contained URLs that were set up for credential phishing attacks.

Successful phishing operations are also often used as the first step in a Business Email Compromise (BEC) attack. According to Microsoft, these attackers usually hack into an executive’s email inbox, monitor email communications, and then sneak in to trick the victim’s business partner into paying invoices to the bank account.

In terms of ransomware, by far the most destructive cybercrime threat in the past year has been ransomware gangs. Microsoft stated that ransomware infections were the most common reason behind the company’s incident response (IR) activities from October 2019 to July 2020.

“Attackers have exploited the COVID-19 crisis to reduce their dwell time within a victim’s system – compromising, exfiltrating data and, in some cases, ransoming quickly – apparently believing that there would be an increased willingness to pay as a result of the outbreak. In some instances, cybercriminals went from initial entry to ransoming the entire network in under 45 minutes.“