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Cybersecurity Risks in Latin America are a Growing Concern

Enterprise Security Magazine | Friday, June 24, 2022

As a group, Latin American countries have consistently shown strong economic growth over the past few decades.

FREMONT, CA: Latin America is perhaps the region with the most significant number of countries exhibiting outstanding economic growth yearly. Venezuela, Chile, and Peru have shown substantial promise, with Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, and Colombia serving as examples. In the midst of an awful global economy, Latin America has performed admirably. Hackers are doing the same while the world stands up and takes attention.

Latin America experienced an increase in Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack under one gigabit per second (Gbps), which accounted for 96.16 percent of the total in 2011 and a 1.47 percent increase from 20101. Midway through 2011, a group known as "Anonymous" launched the "Tormenta del Sur" (Southern Storm) attack on the website of the Chilean Government, rendering it inoperable for almost an hour.

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Similar to burglars, hackers are motivated by money. For hackers, return on investment is an extra factor to consider (ROI). Hackers and, more dangerously, commercial hacking groups seek to maximize their return on investment (ROI)—to reap the greatest possible benefits from their hacking efforts—and what better place to do so than a Latin American market with a recent influx of cash and a burgeoning consumer-driven economy?

Existing criminal groups also "outsource" their operations. For instance, La Familia, a Mexican drug cartel, and Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), a Brazilian criminal organization, have recruited black market hackers who can assist in performing cash-generating crimes.

It is not only about money. Nationalism and patriotism also occasionally get out of control. In 2005, for instance, hackers from Chile and Peru were embroiled in a cyber battle in which no official website was safe, all due to a diplomatic dispute over Pacific Ocean fishing waters4. Midway through 2011, a hacker group again known as "Anonymous" launched an operation named "Free Andes" against the governments of Chile and Peru for allegedly breaching Internet users' freedom of expression and privacy.

Consider another scenario where a corporation is a direct target: an organized cybercrime group decides to target a business because of its rapid expansion in recent years. They have numerous choices. One alternative would be to directly target data and assess the cyber-security defenses and resolve of the firm. Another potentially superior strategy would be to unleash and continue to add bots to target firms with a DDoS attack and then send businesses an extortion email demanding payment to cease the attacks. Any action firms take against this type of assault may cause the attacker(s) to increase the number of bots aimed at the firm. That is significantly less expensive for them than it would be for businesses to hire a company to help them protect against DDoS attacks. If enterprises do arithmetic, they may discover that paying extortion money is the least expensive choice. Organizations in the U.S. and other countries that have partnerships, branches, or affiliations with/in Latin America, or are themselves such, are also attractive targets. Assuming that the counterpart in Latin America is well-protected and has performed the necessary due diligence, these offshore branches become prime entry points into the trusted internal network.

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