Cyber threats

Perpetrators and motivations

The stereotype of a hacker is an individual working for one's self. However, many cyber threats are teams of well-resourced experts. "Growing revenues for cyber criminals are leading to more and more attacks, increasing professionalism and highly specialized attackers. In addition, unlike other forms of crime, cybercrime can be carried out remotely, and cyber attacks often scale well." Many cyberattacks are caused or enabled by insiders, often employees who bypass security procedures to get their job done more efficiently. Attackers vary widely in their skill and sophistication and well as their determination to attack a particular target, as opposed to opportunistically picking one easy to attack. The skill level of the attacker determined which types of attacks they are prepared to mount. The most sophisticated attackers can persist undetected on a hardened system for an extended period of time.