Saudi Arabia target No. 1 for hackers

Jeddah, Nov 25: Saudi Arabia tops the list of countries impacted by advanced targeted cyber attack in META (Middle East, Turkey and Africa) computer networks, accounting for 30.1 percent of the total attacks in the region during the first half of this year, said a report issued by FireEye, a leader in cyber security.

Turkey came second with 29.5 percent, followed by Qatar at 16 percent and the UAE at 7.1 percent. “Motivated by a variety of objectives the threat actors are evolving their level of sophistication to steal personal data and business strategies,” the report said.

FireEye stated that the number of unique infections has been considerably growing in META, nearly doubling between January through June 2014. “We believe advanced cyber attacks often focus on specific verticals, rather than specific countries. Government, financial services and energy verticals represent almost 75 percent of the total advanced persistent threat (APT) malware detections in META,” the report said.

“FireEye has warned for several years now, that 95 percent of businesses unwittingly host computers compromised by unwanted malicious software,” said Ray Kafity, vice president of the organization.

The world of cyber attacks features a broad spectrum of malicious actors. “On one end, highly focused state-sponsored attackers use custom tools and zero-day exploits. On the other, less sophisticated cyber criminals use widely deployed exploit kits that indiscriminately compromise thousands of computer systems around the globe,” said Kafity.

In a related development, security firm Symantec said Monday that a highly sophisticated cyber spying tool has been used since 2008 to steal information from governments, businesses and others.

The malware, known as Regin, was seen “in systematic spying campaigns against a range of international targets,” including governments’ infrastructure operators, businesses, researchers and private individuals.

The malware shares some characteristics with the Stuxnet worm — a tool believed to have been used by the US and Israeli governments to attack computer networks involved in Iran’s nuclear program.

Because of its complexity, the Symantec researchers said in a blog post that the malware “would have required a significant investment of time and resources, indicating that a nation state is responsible.”