Overview of 2024 consumer cyberthreats and trends predictions
Part of the Kaspersky Security Bulletin, our predictions for 2024 identified key consumer cyberthreats and trends shaped by global events, technological advances and evolving user behavior.
Last year, we suggested that charity-related scams would increase globally. While cybercriminals exploited humanitarian crises and charitable causes, taking advantage of both major conflicts and new donation methods, the anticipated boost could not be confirmed. We witnessed cases of abusing such efforts, particularly those associated with the Israeli-Hamas conflict, with Kaspersky researchers uncovering more than 540 scam emails and numerous fraudulent websites that imitated legitimate humanitarian aid campaigns. However, charity platforms’ ever-evolving protective measures and growing integration between charitable giving and day-to-day online shopping have provided more secure and convenient ways for users to make a contribution without exposing themselves to scammers, which also proves our prediction about such collaboration as accurate.
In line with our expectations regarding VPN usage and internet segmentation, 2024 saw a notable global surge in the popularity of VPN and proxy services, with applications gaining significant popularity across various countries. This trend is largely driven by users seeking to bypass regional content restrictions and enhance online privacy. However, this increased demand has attracted malicious actors. Cybercriminals are exploiting the popularity of VPN services by spreading potentially harmful applications disguised as legitimate VPN tools. Kaspersky has reported a surge in these malicious apps, capable of compromising user data and security.
In 2024, the prediction that national security concerns would lead to restrictions imposed on apps and services, thus creating new security issues, proved accurate. Governments worldwide used security as a justification fo ..
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