According to a new report released on Monday, more than 60 percent of mid-sized Indian firms were hit by a cyberattacks last year.
Sophos reported that just under one fifth (19%) of respondents surveyed said they discovered the attack within two weeks, while 22% took three to four weeks to realise they had been attacked.
Even then, many of them only learnt about the attack from an external source.
Sunil Sharma, managing director, sales, Sophos India and SAARC, said “Organisations in India are at significant risk of a cyberattack, including ransomware, which can have a far-reaching impact on customers, reputation and operations,”
He added “In addition, many organisations may be under-prepared to detect and respond to an attack,”
While half of the respondents said they discovered the attack when they could not access data or systems (21%) or were contacted by the attackers (19%), a significant 40% of them only realised they’d been targeted when they discovered their company data exposed online or were informed by customers or the media.
Almost a quarter (23%) of victim organisations disclosed it took more than a month to recover from the impact of cyberattack.
Sharma noted “Attackers can remain in victim networks for weeks before being detected, and a considerable number of organisations learned of the attack from external sources after the damage was done,”
Active threat hunting by humans is now an important part of a defense-in-depth security strategy.
While the fact that 80% of cybersecurity leaders believe threat hunting is a effective approach for boosting their cybersecurity defences is encouraging, the findings show that certain organisations may require support in putting it into practise, according to the report.