Indonesia Is The Second Largest Target For Ransomware In Southeast Asia

Illustration (Pixabay)

JAKARTA - The latest statistics from cybersecurity firm Kaspersky show that Indonesia is the second largest target of ransomware attacks in Southeast Asia. Data shows that there were more than 298,892 cyber attacks aimed at users in Indonesia.

"In Southeast Asia as many as 831,105 ransomware were detected that Kaspersky could block. The numbers were not small and this was detected only in Southeast Asia. Not a small and simple number, a lot of attacks," said Kaspersky Territory Channel Manager for Indonesia, Dony Koesmandarin in virtual press conference, Wednesday September 2nd.

In first place is Vietnam with 385,316 attempts at ransomware attacks in H1 2020. Then, in third place is Thailand with 85,384 attempts at ransomware attacks.

Furthermore, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore are in fourth, fifth and sixth place respectively. Then why ransomware attacks in Indonesia are so high, according to Dony, this happens because the awareness of users in the country is still relatively low.

"Even though ransomware detection in Indonesia was 69 percent lower compared to the same period in 2019, which was 967,372 attacks. But nearly half, namely 49 percent of the efforts detected from January to June 2020 were targeted at the enterprise sector," said Dony.

The enterprise sector that Dony refers to is consumers and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) based on the internet. "Individuals are second highest because there is no protection whatsoever."

Ransomware is a malicious virus or malware designed to damage or block user access to computer systems. Not a few of the ransomware actors ask for a ransom from the user so they can access their computer system again.

It is known that there are five major types of ransomware detected in Indonesia during the first half of 2020, namely Trojan-Ransom.Win32.Wanna, Trojan-Ransom.Win32.Stop, Trojan-Ransom.Win32.Cryakl, Trojan-Ransom.Win32.GandCrypt, Trojan -Ransom.Win32.Gen.

Ransomware is a big challenge for many organizations in the world including Indonesia. In 2019, organizations lost an average of 1.46 million US dollars due to ransomware incidents including downtime fees, payment of fines and reputational damage.

It is feared Dony that the current implementation of work from home could widen the attack surface and increase the loopholes that cybercriminals can exploit. Therefore, Dony hopes that internet users in Indonesia can get used to backing up data or using genuine, non-pirated software.

"Ransomware has become a major challenge for many organizations in the world including Indonesia, although the tactics used are still very outdated, such as phishing emails, websites infected with malicious programs, or outdated software," Dony explained.