Cyberattacks Caused Widespread Disruptions and Losses in 2024
These attacks involve sabotaging systems, locking customers out, and causing prolonged downtime, often to pressure organizations into paying extortion demands.
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In 2024, 500 major breaches across 38 countries and industries revealed that 86% of cyberattacks resulted in operational downtime, reputational damage, or financial loss. Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42 released its 2025 Global Incident Response Report, revealing alarming trends in the cybersecurity landscape.
One key finding is a shift in attack strategies, with financially motivated attackers increasingly focusing on deliberate operational disruption. These attacks involve sabotaging systems, locking customers out, and causing prolonged downtime, often to pressure organizations into paying extortion demands.
The report also highlights a rise in the scale, speed, and sophistication of cyberattacks. The growing use of AI-assisted threats and multipronged intrusions has created a volatile environment where organizations face an evolving threat landscape.
Why Cyberattacks Are Succeeding
Cyberattacks are moving faster than ever before. In 25% of incidents, attackers exfiltrated data in under five hours, a pace that is three times faster than in 2021. In 20% of cases, data theft occurred in under an hour, leaving organizations with little time to react.
Insider threats are increasingly common, particularly from state-sponsored actors. The report notes that incidents tied to North Korean actors tripled in 2024. These attackers often infiltrate organizations by posing as IT professionals, gaining access to systems, and introducing backdoors, stealing data, and altering source code.
Multipronged attacks are now the norm. In 70% of incidents, attackers exploited three or more attack surfaces, which means organizations must simultaneously defend endpoints, networks, cloud environments, and human factors. This complexity has made it harder for security teams to effectively respond.
Phishing, long seen as an outdated method, has resurged as a significant threat vector. In 2024, phishing was responsible for 23% of all initial access breaches, with generative AI making phishing campaigns more sophisticated, convincing, and scalable than ever before.
Cloud-related cyber incidents are also rising. Nearly 29% of cyberattacks involved cloud environments, with 21% of these attacks causing operational damage to cloud assets. Misconfigured cloud environments are increasingly targeted by attackers to find valuable data.
The report emphasizes that attackers are succeeding due to complexity, visibility gaps, and excessive trust. To stay ahead of these evolving threats, organizations must adopt proactive security measures, securing networks and cloud environments and leveraging AI-driven tools for faster detection and response.
