Cyberattacks, corporate espionage now targeting smaller companies

Intellectual property theft, corporate espionage growing

Smaller companies, their websites and their intellectual property are increasingly being targeted by cyberattacks, a new report on IT security trends says. 

Targeted attacks were up 42 per cent in 2012 compared to the year before, and businesses with fewer than 250 employees are the fastest growing segment being targeted, according to the annual internet security threat report issued Tuesday by Symantec.

Based on data from 69 million "attack sensors" around the world, the report said small businesses were hit by 31 per cent of targeted attacks in 2012, up from 18 per cent a year earlier. That represents a 72 per cent increase.

The type of information being targeted by attackers is also changing — financial information is now losing ground to other kinds of competitive data, the report found.
More here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2013/04/15/tech-symantec-trends-report-2013.html