Top 10 cyber incidents during 2024 revealed

The first led to a staggering $5.4 billion in losses

Top 10 cyber incidents during 2024 revealed

Cyber

By Josh Recamara

Tokio Marine HCC has released its "Top 10 Cyber Incidents 2024" report, documenting some of the most significant cyber events of the year. The report underscores an increase in supply chain attacks and vulnerabilities within interconnected systems.

Among the notable incidents:

  1. CrowdStrike IT outage: A flawed software update in July disrupted 8.5 million devices globally, with financial losses reaching $5.4 billion. Recovery efforts required manual intervention despite a rapid fix by the cybersecurity firm.
  2. Change Healthcare ransomware attack: In February, a ransomware attack affected over 100 million individuals in the US, paralyzing healthcare operations and leading to financial damages of $4.457 billion.
  3. CDK global attack: Automotive software provider CDK Global faced a ransomware breach in June, impacting nearly 15,000 dealerships across North America. Recovery was complicated by a subsequent attack.
  4. Israel-Hamas cyber conflict: Amid the ongoing conflict, cyber incidents involving kinetic attacks caused casualties and injuries across the region, highlighting the intersection of physical and digital warfare.
  5. OpenSSH vulnerability: A zero-day exploit in July exposed over seven million instances of OpenSSH servers, emphasizing the critical need for proactive software security measures.
  6. XZ Utils compromise: A critical vulnerability in an open-source library was discovered in March, averting a potential global supply chain attack. Investigations linked the breach to a long-term operation by an unidentified actor.
  7. Ivanti VPN breaches: Vulnerabilities in January and February exposed critical remote access systems, posing risks to enterprise security and supply chains.
  8. Salt Typhoon espionage campaign: Chinese state-sponsored hackers targeted telecommunications infrastructure worldwide, compromising surveillance systems and raising concerns over supply chain resilience.
  9. Blue Yonder ransomware attack: A November breach disrupted retail and grocery supply chains in the US and UK, affecting operations during a peak shopping period.
  10. Snowflake data breach: A May attack on the cloud provider exposed customer data from industries including finance and retail, attributed to weak authentication practices in customer environments.

The report also discusses industry-wide risks, such as dependency on cloud providers, and highlights strategies for resilience. These include adopting multi-cloud frameworks, integrating edge computing, and implementing Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) diversification.

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