Pandemic-Bored Attackers Pummeled Gaming Industry

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Attacks on the gaming industry skyrocketed during the year of the pandemic, with attacks on web applications shooting up 340 percent in 2020.
 
According to Akamai Technologies’ latest State of the Internet and Security report, Gaming in a Pandemic (PDF), cyberattack traffic targeting the video game industry took the cake during 2020, growing at a furious rate that outpaced all other industries during the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
The gaming industry suffered more than 240 million web app attacks in 2020. To be precise, Akamai tracked 246,064,297 web app attacks on the gaming industry globally, representing about 4 percent of the 6.3 billion attacks the company tracked over 2020. Looking back further in time, the increase is even spikier. Since 2018, Akamai has witnessed a 415 percent increase in web app attacks on the gaming industry.
 
“In fact, the year-over-year change globally for web application attacks was only 2%, meaning that gaming saw more growth in attack traffic than any other industry in 2020,” according to the report.
 
“Criminals are relentless, and we have the data to show it,” Steve Ragan, Akamai security researcher and author of the report, was quoted as saying in a press release. “We’re observing a remarkable persistence in video game industry defenses being tested on a daily – and often hourly – basis by criminals probing for vulnerabilities through which to breach servers and expose information. We’re also seeing numerous group chats forming on popular social networks that are dedicated to sharing attack techniques and best practices.”

Read more: Pandemic-Bored Attackers Pummeled Gaming Industry | Threatpost