SonicWall (www.sonicwall.com), a security partner protecting more than one million networks worldwide, has announced research and intelligence from its 2018 Cyber Threat Report. In sum, the company recorded 9.32 billion malware attacks in 2017 and saw more than 12,500 new Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) reported for the year.

“The cyber arms race affects every government, business, organization and individual. It cannot be won by any one of us,” said SonicWall CEO Bill Conner. “Our latest proprietary data and findings show a series of strategic attacks and countermeasures as the cyber arms race continues to escalate. By sharing actionable intelligence, we collectively improve our business and security postures against today’s most malicious threats and criminals.”

The annual threat report frames, compares and contrasts advances made by both cybersecurity professionals and global cybercriminals and finds:

° Cyber attacks are becoming the No. 1 risk to business, brands, operations and financials.

° 9.32 billion total malware attacks in 2017, an 18.4% year-over-year increase from 2016.

° Ransomware attacks dropped from 638 million to 184 million between 2016 and 2017.

° Ransomware variants, however, increased 101.2%.

° Traffic encrypted by SSL/TLS standards increased 24%, representing 68% of total traffic.

° Without SSL decryption capabilities in place, the average organization will see almost 900 attacks per year hidden by SSL/TLS encryption.

° SonicWall identifies almost 500 new previously unknown malicious files each day.

“The risks to business, privacy and related data grow by the day — so much so that cybersecurity is outranking some of the more traditional business risks and concerns,” said Conner.