All Hands on Deck: Announcing the 2015 Cisco Annual Security Report

To help kick off 2015 with new insights in the world of attackers, users, and defenders, we analyzed a significant amount of 2014 security data telemetry from our global customer footprint. We took this data and distilled it into a comprehensive report for you to leverage and are proud to announce that today, we released Cisco’s 2015 Annual Security Report.

Cisco released its first Annual Security Report back in 2007. More recently, to capitalize on our growing ability to view a greater volume of threats in real-time from a greater number of sources, we began to publish a Midyear Security Report as well. While the macro trends remain mostly constant, the data and research in each report highlights how rapidly attackers can innovate malicious activity to exploit new gaps in defenses. The new methods we see in the most recent report certainly show the continued trend of attackers growing smarter and using more nefarious methods to accomplish their goals and hide their tracks. Sometimes, innovative methods include simply bringing old methods back as defenders focus on other areas and as vulnerabilities still exist. In any case, no report is the same as the last and we continue to have our work cut out for us to improve the state of things. Cybersecurity in any organization, no matter what the purposes, needs everyone. “All hands on deck” should be the new corporate security mantra.

Some quick facts about the report: the Cisco 2015 Annual Security Report examines the latest threat intelligence gathered by Cisco security experts, providing industry insights and key findings that reveal cybersecurity trends for 2015. There is a special focus on attackers, users, and defenders and the gaps that lie in between. The report also highlights results from our Security Capabilities Benchmark Study that examines the security posture of enterprises and their perceptions of their preparedness to defend themselves against cyber attacks. Geopolitical trends, global developments around data localization, and the importance of making cybersecurity a boardroom topic are also discussed.

To help bring the key highlights to life and give depth of insight about the contents of the report, I participated in an interview session with Brian Remmel and spoke about the findings. Check it out, download the report and let us know what you think.

May 2015 be better than 2014.