A10 Networks: Cyberattacks will
be the norm this year
Mohammed Al-Moneer,
Regional Vice President, MENA
at A10 Networks, looks at what
cyberthreats enterprises need
to be aware of in 2020.
s we approach the end of this
year’s first quarter, it’s time
to have a look at what is in
store for enterprises. Since we are in
the business of securing our enterprise
customers’ infrastructures, we keep
a close eye on how the security and
encryption landscape is transforming.
Conversely, Elliptical-curve cryptology
(ECC) ciphers will see more than 80%
adoption as older ciphers, such as RSA
ciphers, are disappearing.
Decryption: It’s not a choice
any longer
A
In 2019, ransomware made a comeback,
worldwide mobile operators made
aggressive strides in the transformation
to 5G, and GDPR achieved its first full
year of implementation and the industry
saw some of the largest fines ever given
for massive data breaches experienced
by enterprises. We expect 2020 to bring
a host of the not new, like the continued
rash of DDoS attacks on government
entities and cloud and gaming services,
to the new and emerging. Below are just a
few of the trends we see coming next year:
Ransomware will increase
globally through 2020
• Modular or multi-levelled/layered
ransomware and malware attacks
will become the norm as this evasion
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Issue 23
technique becomes more prevalent.
Modular attacks use multiple trojans
and viruses to start the attack before
the actual malware or ransomware is
eventually downloaded and launched
• 70% of all malware attacks will use
encryption to evade security measures
(encrypted malware attacks)
To no surprise, the cybersecurity skills
gap will keep on widening. As a result,
security teams will struggle with creating
fool-proof policies and leveraging the full
potential of their security investments.
Slow adoption of new
encryption standards
Although TLS 1.3 was ratified by the
Internet Engineering Taskforce in August
of 2018, we won’t see widespread or
mainstream adoption: less than 10% of
websites worldwide will start using TLS
1.3. TLS 1.2 will remain relevant and
therefore will remain the leading TLS
version in use globally since it has not
been compromised yet, it supports PFS,
and the industry is generally slow when
it comes to adopting new standards.
To mitigate firewall performance
challenges and lack of skilled staff,
enterprises will have to adopt dedicated
decryption solutions as a more efficient
option as next-generation firewalls
(NGFWs) continue to polish their on-
board decryption capabilities.
Cyberattacks are indeed the new
normal. Each year brings new security
threats, data breaches and operational
challenges, ensuing that businesses,
governments and consumers have to
always be on their toes.
2020 won’t be any different, particularly
with the transformation to 5G mobile
networks and the dramatic rise in IoT.
The potential for massive and widespread
cyberthreats expands exponentially.
Let’s hope that organisations, as well
as security vendors, focus on better
understanding the security needs of
the industry, and invest in solutions
and policies that would give them a
better chance at defending against the
cyberthreat landscape. u
59
Ransomware attacks are gaining
widespread popularity because they can
now be launched even against smaller
players. Even a small amount of data can
be used to hold an entire organisation,
city or even country for ransom. We
will see at least three new strains of
ransomware types introduced:
Mohammed Al-Moneer, Regional Vice
President, MENA at A10 Networks
TLS decryption will become mainstream
as more attacks leverage encryption
for infection and data breaches.
Since decryption remains a compute-
intensive process, firewall performance
degradation will remain higher than 50%
and most enterprises will continue to
overpay for SSL decryption due to lack
of skills within the security teams.