KINGSTON, Jamaica — Jamaica received 43 million attempted cyber attacks in 2023, according to data from FortiGuard Labs, Fortinet’s threat intelligence and analysis laboratory.

In a statement Wednesday afternoon, Fortinet said the Latin American and Caribbean region suffered 200 billion attempted attacks in 2023, accounting for 14.5 per cent of the total reported globally last year. Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia were the Latin American countries with the highest cyber-attack activity in 2023.

The figure is lower when compared to the previous year’s 360 billion attempted cyber attacks.

Noting that this is still not good news, Fortinet said this is a global trend as there are fewer massive attacks and a greater volume of unique exploits and new malware and ransomware variants that are much more targeted.

“Fewer attacks are designed for specific targets, making them more sophisticated and more likely to succeed if organisations do not have integrated, automated, and up-to-date cybersecurity defences,” the company said.

The report further noted that ransomware continued to have significant activity in 2023.

“While detections may have decreased in volume, this trend supports what FortiGuard Labs has seen in recent years: ransomware and other attacks are becoming increasingly specific and targeted, thanks to the growing sophistication in attackers’ tactics, techniques, and procedures, and their desire to increase ROI per attack. This phenomenon underscores the importance of remaining vigilant and strengthening defenses against potential targeted attacks,” the FortiGuard Labs report said.

It added that during 2023, there was a notable presence of threats linked to Microsoft Office applications.

“By 2023, malware distribution through Microsoft Office files, such as Excel, Word, and PowerPoint, has accounted for almost 50 per cent of malware detections. Therefore, it is recommended to implement awareness strategies among employees and use controls such as Antispam, Antimalware, and EDR, among others, to effectively detect and mitigate this malicious activity,” it said.

According to the report, Prometei, a malware that can remotely control infected machines, has experienced a notable increase in activity in Latin America and the Caribbean during 2023, with Panama and Ecuador as the countries with the highest activity detected.

Prometei has the ability to spread laterally across networks, steal password credentials, and execute arbitrary commands. It can also download and execute additional malicious components and has the capability to perform cryptocurrency mining and update automatically.

Meanwhile, the Double Pulsar exploit continues to top the list as the predominant vulnerability in virtually all Latin American and Caribbean countries, accounting for 75 per cent of all malicious activity detected in the last quarter of 2023.

“There was an exponential increase in malicious activities detected in Mexico during the fourth quarter of 2023, experiencing a staggering growth of 950 per cent compared to the previous year. This phenomenon is primarily linked to a notable increase in reconnaissance tactics actively seeking out exposed systems using the SIP protocol for Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls, providing remote attackers the ability to gather sensitive information or even gain access to vulnerable systems,” the report added.

Fortinet is a leader in enterprise-class cybersecurity and networking innovation and helps to protect over 700,000 organisations worldwide, including global enterprises, service providers, and government organisations.