In this episode of Eye on Security, I had Daniel Kapellmann Zafra, a manager on Mandiant’s Cyber Physical Threat Intelligence team, on to discuss a recent blog post he and his team released on the trend of lower sophistication threat actors targeting operational technology (OT).

We started by discussing a blog post they published last year that explored this trend—specifically the usage of ransomware by financially motivated actors against OT—and we talk about what Daniel is seeing change in this space. Our conversation touches on the various motivations that appear to be shaping this activity, and what it could mean if we continue to see this type of targeting by hacktivists, opportunistic threat actors, and more.

One of the things that I think really comes across in this episode is the thoughtful analysis that Daniel and his team apply to ascertaining the drivers of this trend and where it may be going. It’s an insightful look into an area of threat activity we will likely continue to see headlines around this year. 

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