Attacks Against South African ICS and IoT Systems Steadily Decrease

Twenty-two percent of industrial control systems (ICS) in South Africa were targeted with cyberattacks in the third quarter of 2023.

Kaspersky's ICS CERT said last week it detected and blocked the attacks. On the upside, the numbers show a slight decrease in the number of detections from the first half of the year, when Kaspersky spotted and removed malware on 29.1% of ICS systems in South Africa.

Also the numbers are lower than 2022, when Kaspersky detected and blocked attacks on 38% of ICS systems in the Middle East, Turkey, and Africa. Specific 2022 detection figures for South Africa were not available from Kaspersky.

South Africa also experienced a large percentage of cyberattacks on IoT devices in the third quarter of 2023, with 28% of those systems containing malware. Kaspersky reported that 12% of Kenyan systems harbored IoT-specific malware, while 6% of Nigerian systems carried infections.