Last Updated on January 23, 2016

Spring is at the door, and finally the endless winter is coming to an end. I am just wondering if the crooks are starting to enjoy the first rays of sun, given the relatively low level of attacks in the first half of March.

Effectively, for the first time since several months, no massive breaches have been recorded. But don’t get carried away: the second half of March has begun in the worst possible way with the gigantic breach suffered by Premera (definitely a deja vu).

In any case, during the first half of the month, there have been several remarkable attacks driven by criminal intentions, however none of them has achieved the levels we have been used to in the previous months (not for long unfortunately).

Shifting to hacktivism, the Pro-Palestinian collective Anonghost was back in action, and even the Anonymous were back from stealth mode. However the most active actors have been the pro-isis hackers, who have defaced hundreds of Western sites, forcing the FBI to investigate these incidents. It is impossible to count all the victims, so just a special mention for them.

The Cyber Espionage has maybe offered the most peculiar attack, consisting in the hijacking of the internet traffic for 167 important British Telecom customers (including a UK defense contractor) towards Ukraine, before reaching their final destination. Even if the key question probably remains unsolved: was this a gigantic routing blunder or a very large scale attack?

If you want to have an idea of how fragile our electronic identity is inside the cyberspace, have a look at the timelines of the main Cyber Attacks in 2011, 2012, 2013 and now 2014 (regularly updated). You may also want to have a look at the Cyber Attack Statistics, and follow @paulsparrows on Twitter for the latest updates.

Also, feel free to submit remarkable incidents that in your opinion deserve to be included in the timelines (and charts).

1. http://www.scmagazine.com/attacks-attempt-to-access-rewardsrus-accounts/article/401160/
2. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Rogers-Communications-Hacked-Using-Simple-Social-Engineering-474675.shtml
3. http://pastebin.com/ZjYLwYUZ
4. https://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/03/natural-grocers-investigating-card-breach/
5. http://siph0n.net/exploits.php?id=3731
6. https://www.hackread.com/larimer-county-sheriffs-office-website-hacked-by-pro-palestinian-hackers/
7. http://www.techworm.net/2015/03/vigilante-justice-wrong-hacker-mistakenly-hacks-city-police-websites-two-years-after-cop-jailed.html
8. http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/03/credit-card-breach-at-mandarian-oriental/
9. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Website-for-Religious-Classes-Tainted-with-Malvertising-474789.shtml
10. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Russian-Orthodox-Search-Engine-Knocked-Offline-Hours-after-Launch-474945.shtml
11. https://www.hackread.com/larimer-county-sheriffs-office-hacked-again/
12. http://pastebin.com/2Z61PsCa
13. http://pastebin.com/0acgrsqG
14. https://www.hackread.com/anti-israeli-hackers-target-police-jury-bank-websites/
15. http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/03/09/femsplain-ddos-attack/
16. https://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/03/point-of-sale-vendor-nextep-probes-breach/
17. http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/31798990
18. http://news.softpedia.com/news/San-Francisco-Bistro-Burger-Compromised-Financial-Info-Exposed-for-Two-Months-475430.shtml
19. http://pastebin.com/GsHk4M1V
20. http://www.techworm.net/2015/03/anonymous-take-down-madison-police-department-website-over-tony-robinson-jr-shooting.html
21. http://www.securityweek.com/mybb-says-hacker-didnt-access-user-data-source-code
22. http://pastebin.com/NP3JZNAi
23. https://www.hackread.com/redhack-hacks-istanbul-police-assoc-website-berkin-elvan/
24. http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/proisis-facebook-site-taken-offline/
25. http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/03/mysterious-snafu-hijacks-uk-nukes-makers-traffic-through-ukraine/
26. http://news.softpedia.com/news/Financial-Malware-Infects-Aurora-Health-Care-Workstations-475771.shtml
27. http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-31869595
28. http://www.zataz.com/les-pirates-de-rex-mundi-sattaquent-a-un-laboratoire-danalyse-de-sang-francais/#axzz3UX2dr6Zt
29. http://www.cnet.com/news/state-department-takes-network-offline-for-security-scrub/
30. http://tuoitrenews.vn/business/26762/vietnamese-hackers-allegedly-steal-50000-accounts-from-local-telecom-giant
31. http://www.pnj.com/story/news/2015/03/16/sacred-heart-health-system-billing-information-hacked/24859975/
32. http://www.databreaches.net/bitcoin-baron-tells-moore-oklahoma-thanks-for-letting-me-into-your-system-now-pay-me/
33. http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/34637/hacking/fbi-investigating-alleged-isis-attacks.html