Since 2019, ransomware has expanded by 466%, and it is increasingly being utilised as a precursor to actual combat.

The findings came from Ivanti's Ransomware Index Report Q2-Q3 2022, which the company released to Infosecurity earlier today.

The data also suggests that ransomware groups are becoming more sophisticated and widespread, with 35 vulnerabilities becoming related to ransomware in the first three quarters of 2022 and 159 trending active exploits. Based on the report, 47.4% of ransomware vulnerabilities threaten healthcare systems, 31.6% damage energy systems, and 21.1% affect key manufacturing.

The Ivanti research claims that hostile nations increasingly use state-sponsored threat groups to infiltrate, destabilise, and disrupt operations in their target countries. As displayed in the recent Russia-Ukraine war, ransomware is being utilised as a precursor to physical warfare in many of these operations.

Ivanti executive also noted that IT and security teams need to work on employing automation technology that can not only correlate data from disparate sources, but also quantify risk, provide early warning of weaponisation, predict assaults, and prioritise remedial actions.