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Research: M&E industry most vulnerable to new cyberattacks

August 14, 2024

Palo Alto Networks, the global cybersecurity specialist, has released its latest report revealing that the media and entertainment industry is by far the most vulnerable to new cyberattacks, with businesses in the sector each inadvertently creating well over 7,000 new gaps in their cybersecurity defences every single month.

This is significantly higher than the next highest industry, telecommunications, with telcos each still creating a remarkable 2,900 new gaps in their cybersecurity per month.

The key findings:
  • Media and entertainment industry most vulnerable
    • Analysis revealed that the media and entertainment industry experienced the highest rate of new exposures to their cyber attack surface added, exceeding 7,000 per month.
    • The telecommunications, insurance, pharma and life sciences sectors also faced substantial increases, with over 1,000 new services added to their attack surfaces.
    • Critical industries such as financial services, healthcare, and manufacturing saw their attack surfaces add over 200 new services every month
  • Attack surface change inevitably leads to exposures: Across industries, attack surfaces are always in a state of flux.
    • On average, an organisation’s attack surface has over 300 new services every month.
    • These additions account for nearly 32 per cent of new high or critical cloud exposures for organisations.
  • Critical IT and security services are dangerously exposed to the internet: Over 23 per cent of exposures involve critical IT and security infrastructure, opening doors to opportunistic attacks.
    • These include vulnerabilities in application-layer protocols like SNMP, NetBIOS, PPTP, and internet-accessible administrative login pages of routers, firewalls, VPNs, and other core networking and security appliances.

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