Researchers Found That the Media Industry Is Most Vulnerable to Cyberattacks

Daniel ZimmermannAugust 24, 2022

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According to MDR provider BlueVoyant, the media industry is the most vulnerable to cyberattacks. Many media companies are extremely slow to fix critical bugs.

The media industry faces various types of cybersecurity incidents, including leaks of content on torrent trackers and dark web forums, disruptions on TV channels used to deliver content to consumers, ransomware attacks, and DoS attacks.

The media industry is facing many cybersecurity challenges — from content leaks that directly impact revenue, to cyberattacks on distribution channels, and ransomware. The report shows that media industry vendors are more susceptible to compromise than those in other industries. The silver lining is that the media industry can take proactive steps to improve its cyber defense posture.said Joel Molinoff, BlueVoyant vice chairman and former executive vice president and chief information risk officer for CBS Corporation.

Let me remind you that we also wrote that One of the largest American media holdings News Corp has been hacked, and also that Phineas Fisher contacted the media and offered $100,000 to hackers that would attack banks and oil companies.

BlueVoyant has analyzed almost 500 suppliers. This includes 49 companies that provide content management, production, monetization, and distribution services for most media companies, and 436 vendors whose products and services are widely used but not adopted by the entire industry.

Of all companies, 143 had critical vulnerabilities in Internet-facing systems, which are commonly targeted by attackers. One or more of these vulnerabilities have been found in approximately 30% of media companies, nearly double the multi-industry average of more than a million companies.

Based on the study, content management service providers were the hardest hit, with half of them hosting vulnerable systems. The monetization segment is the most protected: less than 15% of them are subject to attacks.

Today’s interconnected and overlapping virtual ecosystems create challenges for the secure production, distribution, and management of media. From concept to camera and from camera to consumer, media companies are dependent on vendors, service providers, partners, and technologies. The third-party ecosystem is particularly fragmented in the media industry and its dependence on a large number of vendors, varied in size and cyber exposure, adds to the complexity of managing risk.the researchers write.

As a specific example, BlueVoyant cited the Confluence vulnerability (CVE-2022-26134). Atlassian released fixes in early June, but exploitation of the bug began at least a week before. BlueVoyant found that 8 media companies still haven’t applied the fix – 6 weeks after it was released.

BlueVoyant urged media companies to take protective measures, especially in the area of content management. The supply chain is a common attack vector, and strong cyber defenses are critical to prevent leaks, downtime, and disruptions in the manufacturing process.

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