Symantec Internet Security Report 2017

While ransomware and financial fraud groups continue to pose the biggest threat to end users, other threats are beginning to emerge. It was only a matter of time before attacks on IoT devices began to gain momentum, and 2016 saw the first major incident with the emergence of Mirai, a botnet composed of IoT devices such as routers and security cameras. Weak security made these devices easy pickings for attackers, who constructed a botnet big enough to carry out the largest DDoS attack ever seen. Symantec witnessed a twofold increase in attempted attacks against IoT devices over the course of 2016 and, at times of peak activity, the average IoT device was attacked once every two minutes.