|
Residual Pumpkins, Sonic Identities, and Mega Yachts
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Mega Yachts I spent a year working on the boat insurance product at Progressive, and have always been around boats in one way or another. As such, it’s been interesting to read about the Russian oligarchs who are having their assets (including their mega yachts) seized and/or impounded. |
| Cyber War I’ve mentioned in the past that cyber liability insurance carriers are adding more exclusions to their policies and making underwriting guidelines more strict. With the increased likelihood of Russian cyberattacks in conjunction with the war in Ukraine, that brings up the question of war and hostile acts exclusions. It’s probably a good time to chat with your insurance broker to understand your cyber coverage and its exclusions. And if you don’t have cyber insurance, you really should consider it. |
| Cybercrime Stats The FBI just released its 2021 cybercrime statistics which state that businesses lost $6.9B due to cyber attacks. Remote workers are a big reason for continued increase in losses, and business email compromise ($2.4B) continues to lead the way in terms of dollars lost.
Tech support scams, which are generally aimed at older people (are you reading, mom?) accounted for the largest raw number of reported crimes, but only $347M in losses.
Oddly, the FBI report goes on to state that ransomware accounted for only $49.2M in losses. I find that one very difficult to believe, however. Emsisoft (a security solutions provider) reported $1.3B in losses in the US in 2019, while Comparitech claims $21B in losses in 2020 (although that includes losses due to downtime, as well as ransoms). Either way, $49.2M seems a little low for 2021. |
| Milk I’ve posted in the past about Brewers Retail (aka “The Beer Store”) in Ontario having hit by ransomware hackers… now it’s Hood Dairy in Boston (which serves all of New England). While I know I have at least one loyal reader in Beantown (he regularly calls me out for typos), I’m not sure if he drinks milk with his Guinness pints. This is another example of hackers not necessarily wanting to steal your data, but rather knowing that you’ll be more likely to pay the ransom if you can’t run your business. |
White House Warning
Even the White House is warning that you should implement multifactor authentication (MFA) and data encryption on your network and devices, due to the increasing likelihood of Russian cyber attacks.
|