IT Security Stories to Watch: HPE Releases Cyber Risk Report

A new Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) report indicated approximately 75 percent of mobile applications scanned over the past year showed at least one critical or high-severity security vulnerability.

And as a result, HPE tops this week’s list of IT security newsmakers to watch, followed by the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC), Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and University of Greenwich.

What can managed service providers (MSPs) and their customers learn from these IT security newsmakers? Check out this week’s edition of IT security stories to watch to find out:

1. Windows most targeted platform in 2015

Microsoft Windows represented the most targeted software platform in 2015, according to a new Hewlett Packard Enterprise report.

The report, titled “HPE Cyber Risk Report 2016,” showed 42 percent of the top 20 discovered exploits last year were directed at Microsoft platforms and applications. In addition, the report revealed the number of Android threats, malware and potentially unwanted applications grew to more than 10,000 new threats discovered daily in 2015.

“In 2015, we saw attackers infiltrate networks at an alarming rate, leading to some of the largest data breaches to date, but now is not the time to take the foot off the gas and put the enterprise on lockdown,” Sue Barsamian, HPE Security Products’ senior vice president and general manager, said in a prepared statement. “We must learn from these incidents, understand and monitor the risk environment and build security into the fabric of the organization to better mitigate known and unknown threats.”

2. ITRC: 83 data breaches in 2016 so far

Data breaches continue to occur across the globe, which is reflected in new data from ITRC.

ITRC indicated there have been 83 data breaches in 2016 to date, and 1.6 million records have been exposed since the beginning of the year.

In addition, ITRC recorded 781 data breaches in 2015.   

3. IRS warns consumers about e-mail schemes

The IRS has seen an approximate 400 percent surge in phishing and malware incidents so far this tax season.

And as a result, the IRS last week warned consumers about e-mail schemes.

“While more attention has focused on the continuing IRS phone scams, we are deeply worried this increase in email schemes threatens more taxpayers,” IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said in a prepared statement. “We continue to work cooperatively with our partners on this issue, and we have taken steps to strengthen our processing systems and fraud filters to watch for scam artists trying to use stolen information to file bogus tax returns.”

4. Did the University of Greenwich suffer a data breach?

Personal information from hundreds of University of Greenwich students was posted online recently.  

Students’ names, addresses, dates of birth, mobile phone numbers and signatures were published to the university’s website.

BBC News reported the university has apologized for the data leak and is notifying affected students about the incident. 

What are your thoughts on this week’s IT security stories to watch? Share your thoughts about this story in the Comments section below, via Twitter @dkobialka or email me at [email protected].