Kaspersky blocked more than 18.9 million brute-force attacks targeting remote workers in Vietnam in the first six month of 2022, the highest number among Southeast Asian countries, the Russian multinational cybersecurity and anti-virus provider said in a report on Tuesday.

The firm said as hybrid and remote work continue to be the norm in Southeast Asian, it foiled over 47 million Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) attacks from January to June.

On average, Kaspersky solutions blocked 265,567 RDP attacks in the region daily.

During this period, Kaspersky said it secured the most users in Vietnam, with over 18.9 million remote workers protected from this type of threat.

Indonesia followed in second with more than 11.7 million users saved and Thailand came in third with over 8.6 million.

These statistics are based on detection verdicts of Kaspersky products received from users who consented to provide statistical data.

RDP is Microsoft’s proprietary protocol, providing a user with a graphical interface to connect to another computer through a network.

RDP is widely used by both system administrators and less-technical users to control servers and other personal computers remotely.

Kaspersky general manager for Southeast Asia Yeo Siang Tiong said working from home or anywhere out of the office requires employees to log in to corporate resources remotely from their personal devices. One of the most common tools used for this purpose is RDP.

“Microsoft 365 is still the preferred software used by enterprises and Southeast Asia boasts more than 680 million people, half of whom are under 30 and are highly tech-savvy,” said Yeo.

“So, we see the use of this protocol to continue as remote working remains the norm and expect that malicious actors will continue their chase to compromise companies and organizations here through brute-force attacks.”

Kaspersky said with 60 percent of companies allowing employees to use their own devices for work, businesses must train their staff in cybersecurity best practices, so that they are aware of the risks and understand how to work securely with corporate resources.

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