Healthcare Ransomware Threat High Despite Slight Downturn in Attacks in Q3

November 30, 2022 – Published on HIPAA Journal

There was a slight downturn in ransomware attacks in Q3, although it is too early to tell if that downward trend will continue. Even with the reduction in attacks, ransomware is still the biggest cyber threat faced by organizations, and the attacks are among the costliest cybersecurity incidents to mitigate. Attacks on the healthcare industry continue to be conducted in high numbers, with several groups targeting the sector, even though the attacks have the potential to result in loss of life.

GuidePoint Security’s Research and Intelligence Team (GRIT) has been tracking the activity of ransomware gangs and identified 27 active ransomware groups in Q3, a slight decrease from Q2 when there were 30 groups conducting attacks. In Q3, there were 568 publicly posted ransomware victims – a 2.2% decrease from the 581 victims publicly posted in Q2. In Q3, new victims were publicly posted at a rate of 6.24 per day. Of course, there are some caveats with these findings. Some ransomware groups do not add all of their victims to their data leak sites, and some offer not to publicly release any information about an attack if the ransom is paid promptly. That said, figures published by the ransomware remediation firm Coveware indicate the number of organizations paying ransoms is declining.

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