At least 607 Japanese entities, including major firms and government agencies, have been targeted by cyberattacks as hackers exploit vulnerabilities in the technology used for remote work amid the coronavirus pandemic, an information security expert said Monday.
Many of the organizations, which are clients of a virtual private network service provided by Fortinet Inc., had staff IDs, passwords and other authentication data stolen after a list of some 50,000 of the U.S. firm's unpatched VPN appliances was leaked on the internet Nov. 19.
Over 10%, or around 5,400, of the appliances on the list were linked to Japanese entities, including major hotels, cybersecurity firms and public hospitals, according to the expert.