US leads the world in computer attacks

The United States is leading the world in the number of computer attacks that originate from within its borders, according to new data from SecureWorks.

The security as a service provider recorded 20.6 million attempted attacks from computers within the country, compared to the second highest number from China, which made 7.7 million.

However, the company warns that it is not necessarily the case that there are more attackers in America, just that there are more poorly secured computers.

“We believe these statistics are significant because it clearly shows that the United States and China have a lot of vulnerable computers that have been compromised and are being used as bots to launch cyber attacks,” said Hunter King, security researcher for SecureWorks.

“This should be a warning to organizations and personal computer users that, not only are they putting their computers and networks at risk by not securing them, but they are actually providing these cyber criminals with a platform from which to compromise other computers.”

Brazil took third in the league tables with over 166,987 attempted attacks, then South Korea with 162,289, Poland with 153,205, Japan with 142,346, Russia with 130,572, Taiwan with 124,997, Germany with 110,493, and Canada with 107,483.