Just 60% of cybersecurity professionals surveyed indicate that the threat data they receive is both timely and actionable, and only 29% say the data they receive is both extremely accurate and relevant to the threats their organization is facing at that moment. With regard to the timeliness of threat data, only 27% of organizations are able to base their security decisions on near real-time data, while 25% say they receive updates hourly and another 24% receive updates several times per day.
“With the pandemic exacerbating the sheer volume of threats and the nature of remote workforces creating a broader range of vulnerabilities, it is more critical than ever that organizations have access to actionable, contextualized, near real-time threat data to power the network and application security tools they use to detect and block malicious actors,” said Rodney Joffe, chairman of NISC and security CTO, senior vice president and fellow at Neustar. “A timely, actionable and highly relevant security threat data feed can help deliver curated insights to security teams, allowing them to better identify and mitigate risks such as malicious domain generation algorithms, suspicious DNS tunneling attempts, sudden activity by domains with little or no history, and hijacked or spoofed domains.”
According to the report, approximately one-third of organizations state that they have been the victim of a successful domain spoofing attempt (37%) or domain hacking attempt (31%) within the last 12 months.
Findings from the latest NISC research also highlighted a 12.4-point year-on-year increase in the International Cyber Benchmarks Index. Calculated based on the changing level of threats and impact of cyberattacks, the index has maintained an upward trend since May 2017.
During July and August 2020, system compromise and distributed denial-of-service attacks (both 21%) were ranked as the greatest concerns for security professionals, followed by ransomware (20%) and theft of intellectual property (17%). During this period, targeted hacking (63%) was most likely to be perceived as an increasing threat to organizations, followed by ransomware and DDoS attacks (both 62%). In this round of the survey, 72% of participating enterprises indicated that they had been on the receiving end of a DDoS attack at some point, compared to an average of 52% over the 20 survey rounds.
Methodology
The International Cyber Benchmarks Index is based on a bimonthly online survey of security professionals, conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of NISC. Participants in the September 2020 survey comprise 300 professionals from across 6 EMEA and US markets. All are in senior positions within their organizations and able to provide informed opinions about cybersecurity issues, including how these are impacting their enterprise and the wider business community.
The International Cyber Benchmarks Index figure is calculated using five of the survey questions that are repeated in every survey and tracked over time. An initial figure is taken from the percentage of enterprises that say notable recent cyber events have directly affected the way they protect their business. This figure is multiplied by the average “net increase” percentages from across three separate questions, reflecting (1) the change in the level of threat, (2) the change in the level of attack and (3) the change in the threat landscape. This figure is then multiplied by the percentage of enterprises that have ever been on the receiving end of a DDoS attack. The maximum (theoretical) potential index score is 100.
About the Neustar International Security Council (NISC)
The Neustar International Security Council is an elite group of select cybersecurity leaders across key industries and companies. Through face-to-face events including an annual summit, quarterly thought-leadership seminars and regional roundtables, members learn and share the latest trends from leading experts and peers. For more information: https://www.nisc.neustar/.
About Neustar
Neustar is an information services and technology company and a leader in identity resolution providing the data and technology that enables trusted connections between companies and people at the moments that matter most. Neustar offers industry-leading solutions in Marketing, Risk, Communications and Security that responsibly connect data on people, devices and locations, continuously corroborated through billions of transactions. Neustar serves more than 8,000 clients worldwide, including 60 of the Fortune 100. Learn how your company can benefit from the power of trusted connections here: https://www.home.neustar.
