January 2024 had a whopping 4,645 cyber incidents, accounting for more than 29 billion records. This compares to 277.6 million records breached in January 2023.

Here’s the other top stories you need to read:

Historic data breach

A historic data leak reveals 26 billion records, almost certainly the largest ever discovered. It has been colloquially named as the ‘mother of all breaches.’

New government guidelines for cyber

The UK Government has unveiled new cyber threat guidelines after 32% of firms suffer attacks in the past year.

The top 10 cyber security stories of 2023

From spear-phishing to AI threats, here’s a review of the top 10 cyber stories of 2023.

Ransomware threat for financial services

Ransomware trends signal further woes for UK financial services as there has been an increase in ransomware incidents in the first half of 2023.

  • The FCA received 51 cyber incident reports in 2023 (classified as material incidents), up 10% compared to 2022.
  • Twice as many ransomware incidents were reported in 2023 compared to the same period in 2022.
  • Nearly a third of all cyber incidents reported were categorised as ransomware.

Business cyber resilience boost

Business leaders have been given new guidance on how to boost their cyber resilience, as the government urged firms to consider cyber threats as a key business risk in the same way as financial or legal challenges.

Ivanti vulnerabilities

Organisations are encouraged to take immediate action to mitigate vulnerabilities affecting Ivanti Connect Secure (ICS) and Ivanti Policy Secure (IPS) gateways (CVE-2023-46805 and CVE-2024-21887) and follow the latest vendor advice. Ivanti is an asset management software that is used to remotely manage and support desktop computers, and may be used in your network to run security patches for example. The NCSC has shared an update.

The Post Office Horizon cyber security scandal

A cyber security expert has shed some light on what exactly went so catastrophically wrong with the Horizon computing system, which destroyed the lives of hundreds of sub-postmasters.

Risk of ransomware rises with AI

The U.K.’s National Cyber Security Centre has released a new study that finds generative AI may increase risks from cyber threats such as ransomware.

The impact of the ransomware attack on the British Library

After the British Library has been paralysed by a ransomware hack, what does it mean for the Londoners who rely on it — and are more government organisations at risk?

Reducing the risk of online cloud services

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has today published a new guide for small and medium-sized businesses on how they can reduce the likelihood of cyber attacks when using online ‘cloud’ services.

The burden of cyber legislation

Manufacturers of ‘smart’ products sold in the UK face an administrative burden and technical challenges to comply with new cybersecurity requirements due to take effect in less than three months.