New ransomware grows 118% as cybercriminals adopt fresh tactics and code innovations

McAfee Labs saw an average of 504 new threats per minute in Q1 2019, and a resurgence of ransomware along with changes in campaign execution and code.

The number of new ransomware samples more than doubled in the first quarter of this year, a new study by McAfee Labs shows. New ransomware increased by 118%, while the most prevalent strains were Dharma (aka Crysis), GandCrab and Ryuk.

McAfee detected criminals uploaded over 2.2 billion stolen account credentials on the dark web. The most common attack vector was malware, followed by account hijacking. New malware samples rose by 35%, but those targeting Mac OS actually decreased by 33%. Other notable trends are the rise of targeted campaigns and of fileless attacks. HelpNet Security has a good summary of the whole report.

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