5 June 2024
In the first quarter of 2024, only 56% of incidents with financial loss were below $500. This percentage has been decreasing over the last three quarters and compared to 63.5% in quarter one of 2023.
At the same time, there were ten incidents with losses over $100,000. These make up nearly 70% of the total losses reported.
"We hope that New Zealanders who might normally be caught out by less costly scams are getting better at spotting them," said CERT NZ Acting Director Sue Critchlow. "Creating a more cyber resilient nation requires us to keep alert for incidents and scams of all sizes and categories. CERT NZ is working hard to raise everyone's awareness."
At the same time as overall financial losses are rising, CERT NZ is seeing a decline in reports.
CERT NZ relies on reports from members of the public to assess and act against online threats. This includes large incidents down to ongoing scam emails trying to steal personal information.
Even phishing reports give information about the websites the scammers are using. CERT NZ's Phishing Disruption Service – that is servicing thousands of organisations across the country – can prevent access to malicious websites, but to do this, the sites need to be reported first.
This quarter’s Insight Report looks at what happens behind the scenes when CERT NZ receives a report and how reporting increases the cyber resilience of Aotearoa.
"We understand that it can seem futile to report, with new scam messages cropping up almost every week," said Critchlow, "but we can't overstate the importance of gathering that information, as it gives us an advantage over the cyber criminals."