Software Supply Chain Attacks are Skyrocketing
Global supply chain issues continue to persist to the point that they are circumventing earlier predictions that they would begin easing by now. They are getting worse, not better, due in part to prolonged Covid-19 lockdowns in parts of China and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which cut off their exports.
This is no small thing given that Ukraine is a major global supplier of foodstuffs and the world’s leading source of neon, a gas needed for the lasers used in the chip-making process – and the last thing needed in the already supply-constrained semiconductor industry.
As significant as these supply chain issues are, yet another big one is now coming to the forefront – software-based supply chain attacks. These garner far less attention even though they distribute substantially more pain than other types of cyberattacks.
According to a study by Argon Security, an Israeli cybersecurity firm that specializes in protecting the integrity of the software supply chain, software supply chain attacks grew by more than 300 percent in 20231 in comparison to 2020.
And another recent study of more than 400 IT executives and managers by Anchore Enterprise, a California-based developer of a security-centric software supply chain management platform, found that three in five companies last year were targeted by software supply chain attacks.
A supply chain attack, also known as a third-party attack, occurs when hackers infiltrate an organization’s system through an outside partner or provider with poor security practices and access to its systems and data. More suppliers and service providers are touching sensitive data than ever, dramatically expanding the attack surface of most enterprises in recent years. Any company that produces software or hardware for other organizations is a potential target of attackers.
Cybercriminals are increasingly targeting software supply chains because these attacks allow them to compromise hundreds or thousands of victims through a single breach, while simultaneously affording them extensive internal access in the systems. Any breach can be damaging, of course, but a supply chain attack often is far worse because it frequently has a higher level of access to the network. Hackers can also be harder to detect.
