Origin of Cryptocurrency Attacks is Africa!

The origin of cryptocurrency attacks is Africa! Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky has released the statistics.

Russian cybersecurity firm Kaspersky reported that it has identified more than 1,500 fraudulent organizations targeting potential cryptocurrency investors and miners in just the first half of 2021. Kaspersky's research revealed that 0.60% of users in South African countries are already targeted by malicious cryptocurrency miners. The report also informed that users are defrauded by the most common methods by selling mining equipment, taking fake exposure on cryptocurrency exchanges, and placing false advertisements on websites. Kaspersky's anonymized statistics-based data revealed that 0.85% of cryptocurrency investors from Kenya and 0.71% of Nigerians are targets of cryptocurrency miner malware. It also proved that investors in Ethiopia (3.68%) and Rwanda (3.22%) face the most threats in this regard.

Threats in Cryptocurrencies Will Increase

Bethwel Opil, Africa's head of corporate sales at Kaspersky, said low percentages do not mean that the threat is insignificant. “The cryptocurrency mining malware has been identified as one of the top 3 malware families currently prevalent in South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria. We think this will target more users as cryptocurrencies continue to gain momentum.” Stating that cybercriminals use phishing platforms to access the private keys of users' cryptocurrency wallets, Alexey Marchenko, the company's head of content filtering methods development, used the following statements: "Both those who want to invest or mine cryptocurrency and the owners of such funds may find themselves on the radar of scammers. One has to be very careful about this."