Government agencies rely on IoT and OT devices to carry out their missions and manage everything from security cameras and personal identity verification (PIV) card readers that monitor and control access to facilities and data, to environmental controls that improve comfort, safety and efficiency. Data centers couldn’t operate around the clock without tightly controlled air conditioning, electricity and other physical infrastructure, much of which relies on IoT.

On September 12, the FBI released a private industry notification entitled “Unpatched and Outdated Medical Devices Provide Cyber Attack Opportunities.” The notification underscores how a growing number of vulnerabilities in medical devices and Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) assets can be exploited by threat actors to “impact healthcare facilities’ operational functions, patient safety, data confidentiality and data integrity.”

Throughout the first half of 2022, Vedere Labs published analyses of prominent ransomware families, such as Conti, Night Sky and ALPHV. We also examined well-known ransomware incidents such as the attacks on the NFL’s SF 49ers by the BlackByte group; on a UK water utility, where the Clop gang managed to access their SCADA system; and on an NHSsoftware provider, where an unknown group managed to disrupt healthcare services in the UK for weeks.

In our companion blog post, Vedere Labs analyzed the main ransomware trends we observed in the first half of 2022, including state-sponsored ransomware, new mainstream targets and evolving extortion techniques. Ransomware is the main threat targeting most organizations nowadays. However, three other notable cyberthreat trends also evolved during this period: Below we analyze each of these trends in more detail.

Many industries are affected by skills gaps, but according to Cybersecurity Ventures, the shortage within the IT/cybersecurity sector is nearly unmatched: Over an eight-year period, the number of unfilled cybersecurity jobs increased from one million positions in 2013 to 3.5 million in 2021.

On August 4, 2022, Advanced – a major software provider for the UK’s National Health System (NHS) and other healthcare customers – suffered a ransomware attack from a group that is still unknown to the public. The attack disrupted NHS services including ambulance dispatch, appointment bookings, patient referrals and emergency prescriptions.