Russian financial sector is ever increasingly attacked by cybercriminals, says Stanislav Kuznetsov, the Deputy Chairman of the Board of Sberbank, according to the Interfax news agency.

During the whole of 2015, the internal security service of the Russia’s biggest bank noted fifty-two critical cyberattacks. In a little more than five months of 2016, fifty-seven such attacks have been already reported.

In 2015, a total of 43,000 cybercrimes were recorded in Russia but Kuznetsov believes it is an underestimation. From his point of view, with yearly losses of 600 billion rubles (9 billion USD) Russia suffers more damage from cybercrime than many other countries because of the inadequacy of its legislation and the lack of competence among judges and investigators.

However, he believes that on a worldwide scale the situation is hardly any better. The total losses suffered by the world economy, according to Sberbank’s estimate, have reached $500 billion, and even this number can be downplayed, says Kuznetsov. In any case, by 2018 Sberbank believes these figures will grow at least fourfold. The three countries having a record number of infected computer devices are Russia, Brazil and the US.

Kuznetsov said that already in 2015, Sberbank has started forming the Information Security Operation Centre, which includes a fraud monitoring department. Over the last year, the bank spent a total of 1.5 billion rubles (23 million USD) on information security.

Recently, various cybersecurity issues were discussed at a meeting with Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, heads of major Russian banks and the Central Bank, called by Sberbank. The company proposed an anti-cybercrime interbank network solution, according to some rеpоrts, built on the blockchain.

Alexey Tereshchenko