PHILADELPHIA, Nov. 19, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- EfficientIP,
specialists in Domain Name System (DNS) security for service
continuity, user protection and data confidentiality, reveals
government organizations were hit by the highest number of DNS
attacks per year in this IDC Infobrief, sponsored by EfficientIP,
2019 Global DNS Threat Report. Government suffers an average of 12
DNS attacks per year, with each attack costing an average of
$558,000, amounting to $6.7 million annually.
Over half (51%) of government organizations suffered in-house
application downtime as a result of DNS attacks in the last 12
months, rendering potentially vital services inaccessible, while
43% faced cloud service downtime. 41% of organizations were
impacted by compromised websites, putting data at risk. Almost one
in five (19%) government respondents also reported sensitive
information or intellectual property being stolen via DNS, by far
the highest among all industries.
The typical DNS attack takes over seven hours for government
organizations to mitigate, leaving the door wide open to a huge
potential loss of sensitive personal and financial data. 51% of
government respondents admitted to shutting down a server to stop
an attack once underway, indicating that the countermeasures in
place are not adapted to ensure service continuity.
Despite the risk, one-third (32%) of government respondents
don't recognise the critical nature of DNS to operations, stating
DNS security is only low or moderately important. Furthermore, one
third (32%) of government sector respondents don't perform
analytics on DNS traffic, suggesting respondents are potentially
unaware of how DNS downtime deprives users access to essential
applications or government services.
David Williamson, CEO of
EfficientIP, commented on the report's findings:
"With an increasing number of government services moving online,
hackers have more points of attack to exploit than ever before.
When 91% of malware uses DNS, analysis of DNS transactions is vital
for uncovering these dangerous threats hidden in network traffic.
In particular, the detection of data exfiltration via DNS requires
visibility and analytics on transactions from the client to the
destination domain.
Despite this, our latest research shows governments are
significantly more exposed than other sectors to DNS attacks. This
is unacceptable when governments are trusted with sensitive
information by their citizens, so they need to understand the
potential risks to protect both themselves and the public."
Government was tied with healthcare as the sectors putting the
least importance on Machine Learning (ML) for detecting unknown
malicious domains or Domain Generation Algorithms (DGAs).
Government also has the lowest rate of adoption for the Zero Trust
cybersecurity approach of any sector surveyed.
ENDS
Notes to Editors
The IDC InfoBrief 2019 Global DNS Threat Report - EUR145072419
The research was conducted by IDC from January to April 2019. The results are based on 904
respondents in three regions - North
America, Europe and
Asia Pacific. Respondents included
CISOs, CIOs, CTOs, IT Managers, Security Managers and Network
Managers.
To read the full IDC InfoBrief please click here.
About EfficientIP
EfficientIP is a network automation and security company,
specializing in DNS-DHCP-IPAM solutions (DDI), with the goal of
helping organizations worldwide drive business efficiency through
agile, secure and reliable infrastructure foundations. Integrated
solutions enable IP communication and simplify network management
with end-to-end visibility and smart automation, while patented
technology secures DNS services to safeguard data and ensure
application access. Companies in all sectors rely on EfficientIP
offerings to face the challenges of key IT initiatives such as
cloud applications and mobility. For further information, please
visit: https://www.efficientip.com.
SOURCE EfficientIP