Data Breach Investigation Report, 2012.

摘要

2011 will almost certainly go down as a year of civil and cultural uprising. Citizens revolted, challenged, and even overthrew their governments in a domino effect that has since been coined the Arab Spring, though it stretched beyond a single season. Those disgruntled by what they perceived as the wealth-mongering 1% occupied Wall Street along with other cities and venues across the globe. There is no shortage of other examples. This unrest that so typified 2011 was not, however, constrained to the physical world. The online world was rife with the clashing of ideals, taking the form of activism, protests, retaliation, and pranks. While these activities encompassed more than data breaches (e.g., DDoS attacks), the theft of corporate and personal information was certainly a core tactic. This re-imagined and re-invigorated specter of hacktivism rose to haunt organizations around the world. Many, troubled by the shadowy nature of its origins and proclivity to embarrass victims, found this trend more frightening than other threats, whether real or imagined. Doubly concerning for many organizations and executives was that target selection by these groups didnt follow the logical lines of who has money and/or valuable information. Enemies are even scarier when you cant predict their behavior. It wasnt all protest and lulz, however. Mainline cybercriminals continued to automate and streamline their method du jour of high-volume, low-risk attacks against weaker targets. Much less frequent, but arguably more damaging, were continued attacks targeting trade secrets, classified information, and other intellectual property. We certainly encountered many faces, varied tactics, and diverse motives in the past year, and in many ways, the 2012 Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR) is a recounting of the many facets of corporate data theft.