The enterprise sector in the Philippines has been seeing an alarming number of malicious attacks in their networks. However, many do not report this due to fears or repercussions from business partners and customers that they are not entirely secure against hackers and creators of malware.
Statistics on malicious attacks in the Philippines are hard to come by, largely because many victims do not report these attacks to authorities. Even more alarming is that some victims do not know that they are already being attacked, with their valuable company information being passed on undetected to cybercriminals.
Concerns of cybercrime in the Philippines
Suk Ling Gun, Corporate Sales Director for Kaspersky Lab Asia says that any country in Asia that has a population of Internet users will always be targets for cybercriminals. The Philippines is no exception and Filipino companies are always under threat of having their most important data stolen.
Citing their previous reports, Gun says there is at least one malicious program appearing every 1.2 seconds compared to just five malicious programs every 2 minutes. Citing another Kaspersky Lab survey, she says 96% of companies were faced by external cyber threats, 45% of companies reported a growth in the number of threats. Of this survey, 46% of companies have lost critical data due to these attacks.
“These problems are real and they could get worse especially when businesses expand their operations. They become more enticing targets to hackers,” says Gun.
A report by the Philippine National Police-Anti-Transnational and Cyber Crime Division (PNP-ATCCD) showed an alarming number of cyberattacks on individuals, corporations and even government offices. These attacks vary from simple website defacement, to fraud using Facebook and Twitter, identity theft of credit cards, and even harassment through email or mobile phones.
According to PNP-ATCCD Police Inspector Felizardo Eubra, Jr., there were 109 cases of various forms of digital attacks as of the end of November 2011, up from just 72 in 2010. He stresses that these numbers are only the ones that have been reported either because the victims fail to do so or are not even aware that they are being victimized.
“There are still that go unreported. This is just the tip of the iceberg. No one is safe from these types of attacks, more so if you’re a company because attackers will target those that they see as more lucrative especially because of the information they keep,” according to Eubra.
With the scope of security problems, the company is bringing its Kaspersky Endpoint Security version 8.0 in the Philippines, the first time that Kaspersky Lab is bringing this particular enterprise level product and service to the country.
Kaspersky Lab Senior Product Marketing Manager Peter Beardmore highlights the key components of Kaspersky Endpoint Security 8. He points to Kaspersky’s exclusive Four-Point Approach that can classify, control, enforce and inspect applications that are running on a corporate network. This ensures that all activities in different applications remain safe.
Among its notable features are its Application Activity Monitor that classifies software as trusted, low restriction, high restriction and un-trusted. Application Startup Control sets the policies on allowing application to run during startup. Application Privilege Control enforces rules on specific functions of applications installed in the network, which ensures that certain software cannot be exploited by infection of malware.
Kaspersky Endpoint Security 8 also has Vulnerability Monitoring that checks for applications for potential exploits and alert the IT manager of potential threats. It also has a deep, granular Device Control that expands the protection of IT infrastructure from outside threats launched through USB drives and other attached devices.
Finally, the Kaspersky Endpoint Security 8 also has an effective Web Control function wherein certain websites can be restricted from being accessed during certain periods or even permanently. This allows the company to lessen the consumption of bandwidth in their corporate network. It also uses the cloud-based Kaspersky Security Network that provides 24/7 protection through monitoring and reporting of security concerns by a global network of monitoring facilities.
For further information, visit http://www.kaspersky.com.