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Summary
- Opposition urges the New Zealand Government to make stringent policies against cybercrime.
- COVID-19 has an increased impact on the cases of cybercrime across the country.
- New Zealand’s UN Ranking for Cyber Crime Resilience witnesses massive plunge.
Recently, the problem of cybercrime has taken a serious turn with several ransomware attacks being carried out by hackers in exchange for huge sums of money. The cyber resilience of the world seems to have suffered at the hands of hackers who hold data for ransom.
While the opposition party has implied that the Labour Government hadn’t been doing a good job in keeping the country safe from cybercrime, the UN ranking for resilience for the same has also seen a massive fall. While New Zealand used to be placed at the 19th spot in 2017, it has fallen to the 48th spot in 2021.
Image Source: © 2021 Kalkine Media
Major stocks and sectors affected
While cyber attacks are something being witnessed every week these days, it is being alleged by the opposition that the Government isn’t doing much about it. While there have been attacks on Fisher and Paykel, the New Zealand stock exchange, and The Reserve Bank of the country in the past, the recent one on the Waikato District Health Board revealed how not a single sector was safe from this monstrosity. It was added that the effects of these attacks should continue to alter the lives of several people and their families for many years to come.
Also read: Secure your data, there could be a global cyber attack on its way
The RBNZ, the most important bank of the country, when fell prey to a cyber attack back in January 2021, was immediately taken offline for further investigation and securing networks in order to prevent something of a similar nature from happening again. The central bank is responsible for a lot of classified information on the monetary policies of the country besides information on the general financial health of the same. While there were no other details laid out by the RBNZ, it is still uncertain about the extent of the impact the cyber attack has left.
Don’t miss: Burger Chain McDonald’s Becomes Latest Victim Of Cyberattack
Also read: Cyber attacks on the rise in Australia as cyber criminals spare no sector
Work from home and Cybercrime
While remote working was a need of the hour considering the situation of the pandemic, and has helped several people keep their livelihoods even while being at home, it has definitely opened a world full of risk to data, which was otherwise secure in the confines of office spaces. COVID-19 times have undoubtedly risen the number of cybercrime cases in the country as well as the rest of the world, and governments need to come out with a solid plan of action to tackle these miscreants that trouble people for money and other gains.
Don’t miss: Cyber security fraud incidents in New Zealand rise sharply in Q1
