Security Predictions for 2022| WatchGuard Blog

In our 2021 Security Predictions, the WatchGuard’s Threat Lab team anticipated that authentication would be the cornerstone of strong security. “With billions of usernames and passwords ripe for the picking on the dark web and the prevalence of automated authentication attacks, we believe that any service without MFA enabled will be compromised in 2021,” said WatchGuard CSO Corey Nachreiner. Now, 12 months later, we see how MFA has consolidated its prominence in the industry that we had predicted- among other interesting findings.-

One of the most prominent cybersecurity trends of 2022 is that cyber insurance costs are going to skyrocket and that protecting sensitive data with multi-factor authentication (MFA) is a must to obtain cyber insurance.

Since the astronomical success of ransomware starting back in 2013, cybersecurity insurers have realized that payout costs to cover clients against these threats have increased dramatically. Insurance companies want to make sure that their customers have strong risk mitigation in place before they write a policy. In fact, we have been observing this growing phenomenon for the past three years, with insurers' cybersecurity claims increasing by more than 72% according to a report by S&P Global.

It is not surprising therefore that insurers started asking companies to ensure they have implemented an MFA system across the company for all their email accounts, VPN networks for remote working and, of course, for their servers and firewalls before they can take out a policy. That was the line they took initially, now it has become an essential requirement. This means that many companies that do not have a reliable and secure MFA solution in place for their user accounts will not be able to access any kind of cyber insurance. This undoubtedly makes MFA a game changer.

And that's not all that's new for 2022. In our security predictions for the next year, we believe we will see an increase in sophisticated cybercriminal mobile attacks due to the state-sponsored mobile attacks that have started to come to light.

You shouldn’t be surprised if we see a space-related hack in the headlines one day soon. With renewed government and private focus on the “space race” and recent cybersecurity research concentration on satellite vulnerabilities, we believe a hack in space will hit the headlines in 2022.

Interested in how this trend will play out and what other emerging security issues might surface next year? Don’t miss all the Security Predictions for 2022.