38+ Shocking COVID-19 Cybersecurity Statistics in 2022

written by

Jack Foster

last updated

January 21, 2022

Coronavirus started rearing its ugly head in January 2020, making headline news worldwide. On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization announced COVID-19 a worldwide pandemic, changing the lives of everyone around the globe.

As shops and streets became empty and many of us were forced to work from home, it’s no surprise that cyber attacks have become more common, making vulnerable individuals and businesses an easy target.

Remote Work COVID-19 Data Breach Statistics

  • Remote work has increased the average cost of a data breach by a whopping $137,000
  • In March 2020, the search term “how to remove a virus” increased by 42%
  • 47% of employees said distraction was the main reason for falling for a phishing scam whilst working from home
  • 76% of remote workers say that working from home would increase the time to identify and contain a breach
  • Between January and March 2020 there was an increase of 8.3% in mobile VPN usage
  • Web application breaches have double since 2019 and account for 43% of all breaches
  • 52% of legal and compliance leaders say they are concerned about third-party cyber risks due to remote work

Data Breaches By Industry Statistics

  • At $7.13 million, healthcare cybersecurity breaches cost the most out of any other industry
  • Confirmed data breaches in the healthcare industry increased by 58% in 2020
  • 98% of point of sale data breaches in the accommodation and food services industry were financially motivated
  • Ransomware groups targeted aid organizations, medical billing companies, manufacturing, transport, educational software, and government institutions in April 2020
  • 52% of compliance leaders say the most-increased third-party risk for their organization is cybersecurity

Coronavirus Cyberthreats Statistics

  • COVID-19 is the biggest-ever security threat where scams increased by 400% over the month of March
  • In the UK, over 470 fake online shops were taken down following the sale of fraudulent COVID-19 items
  • 450 active WHO email addresses were leaked in April 2020
  • Between March and May 2020, visits to popular hacker websites and forums increased by 66%
  • Each day 1767 high-risk Coronavirus related domains are created
  • Over 500,000 Zoom accounts were compromised and sold on a dark web forum
  • In April 2020, Google blocked 18 million daily malware and phishing emails related to Coronavirus
  • Ransomware is up 72% since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic
  • Phishing grew by 667% in March 2020 with people more likely to click on an email containing words like COVID and Coronavirus

Financial Cybersecurity Statistics

  • The average cybersecurity breach costs $3.86 million to companies and can take 280 days to identify and contain
  • Zoom account credentials are being sold for as little as $0.0020 on the dark web
  • By 2021 it’s estimated that cybercrime will cost $6 trillion annually
  • Worldwide organizational cybersecurity spend is expected to decrease by 8% in 2020
  • On average, customer PII costs $150 per record
  • 70% of CISOs and security buyers have forecast security budgets will shrink in 2021
  • 54% of the UK who experienced a loss of income due to COVID-19 were also a victim of cyber scams
  • Worldwide government spending on IT is forecasted to reach $438 billion by the end of 2020

Cybercrime Statistics By Country

  • US cybersecurity breaches cost more than any other country at $8.64 million
  • North America will spend the most money on government IT globally in 2020
  • Victims of COVID-19 related scams in the UK lost over £11 million collectively as of July 8th, 2020
  • 85% of victims and threat actors live in the same country
  • The GDPR criticized the UK for lack of data privacy legislation with regard to the test and trace program
  • The Czech Republic reported a cyberattack on Brno University Hospital, shutting down its entire IT network
  • The FBI and CISA reported the People’s Republic of China targeting the intellectual property of COVID-19 research organizations
  • The spike in attacks against the Republic of Korea was higher than the worldwide average in early March, following the early arrival of the virus to the country

References

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