Can The Public Sector Face The Coming Wave Of Attacks?

Citizens cannot opt out of giving government agencies or public institutions their most personal and private information, whether their financial details, their diseases and medications, or their children’s health and education records. When this personal data ends up on the dark web at the hands of an anonymous hacker, it is personally devastating; it also opens the victims up to harassment, identify theft, and fraud, and shatters their trust in the agencies they need to trust most.

Given the level of damage that can be caused by these attacks, it should not be surprising that the public sector is becoming an increasingly attractive target for cybercriminals. But just how attractive is alarming.

According to Blackberry’s second Quarterly Threat Intelligence Report in August 2023,1 cyberattacks against government agencies and public sector services were up 40% in the second quarter of 2023 compared to the first. Government and public entities were among the top four attack targets.