On February 24, IBM Security released the 2021 X-Force Threat Intelligence Index, highlighting how cyber attacks evolved as threat makers sought to profit from the challenges posed by the pandemic.

According to the data, attacks on organizations vital to virus response efforts (hospitals, pharmaceutical & medical device manufacturers and energy companies) have doubled from the previous year. In fact, manufacturing and energy were the most affected sectors in 2020, behind only the financial and insurance sector.

The scams in which cybercriminals impersonate famous brands have also multiplied. In this type of practice, consumer demand for coveted items is exploited, leading them to malicious websites that copy known environments to make online payments, steal financial information, collect credentials or infect "victims" devices.

The report further suggests that attackers are taking advantage of the scalable processing power that "cloud" environments provide, passing heavy cloud usage loads to affected organizations, as Intezer has observed more than 13% of new, previously unseen code in Linux malware cryptography mining in 2020.