Prague, Czech Republic, April 4, 2022 — Avast (LSE:AVST), a global leader in digital security and privacy, today released its 2021 Global PC Risk Report. The report looks at the threats home and business Windows users encountered over the course of the past year. American business users ranked 10th out of the 77 countries included in the report. On average, business users around the world had a 15.10% chance of encountering a threat, and in the US, business users had a 12.6% of encountering a threat.

“While businesses are less at risk of encountering a threat than consumers, they more often than not have more to lose if they do fall victim. Digital threats put businesses’ productivity, profits, and their reputation on the line. One attack can potentially cost a business profitability, productivity, or the entire business, depending on the severity,” said Jakub Kroustek, Avast Malware Research Director. “We observed a decline in ransomware attacks at the end of 2021 as a result of the coordinated cooperation of nations, government agencies, and security vendors to tackle ransomware gangs. Unfortunately, the ongoing war in Ukraine could spill over into the cyber world, as we have seen in the past, and businesses worldwide could be affected.”

The countries in which business users are most at risk of encountering threats are:

1. Vietnam (37.80%)
2. China (35.65%)
3. Tanzania (35.29%)
4. Pakistan (35.61%)
5. Croatia (32.55%)
6. Bulgaria (31.64%)
7. Mozambique (30.54%)
8. Indonesia (30.29%)
9. Bangladesh (30.07%)
10. Taiwan (29.78%)

The ten countries with the lowest risk of encountering threats are: 

1. Sweden (9.52%)
2. Norway (10.86%)
3. Luxembourg (11.24%)
4. Ireland (11.52%)
5. United Kingdom (11.71%)
6. Germany (11.83%)
7. Puerto Rico (11.86%)
8. Netherlands (11.86%)
9. Switzerland (12.00%)
10. United States (12.60%)

Business users are less at risk than home users of encountering threats, as they often have layers of protection in place, and their networks and devices are often managed by IT-Security professionals, preventing them from encountering threats in the first place. 

Avast’s 2021 Global PC Risk Report, including regional breakdowns can be found here:  https://press.avast.com/2021-avast-global-pc-risk-report.

Methodology 

The data included in this report is collected from Avast’s threat detection network, and represents the average ratio of Avast users protected from at least one threat divided by the total number of active Avast users from January 1, 2021 - December 31, 2021. In order to provide statistically relevant data, this report includes data from countries and territories with a sample size of at least 10,000 computers belonging to home users that encountered threats during the months the data was collected, and at least 1,000 computers used by businesses. The regional breakdowns included in this report includes data from regions with a sample size of at least 1,000 computers belonging to home users that encountered threats during the months the data was collected and at least 100 computers used by businesses. 

With hundreds of millions of users worldwide, Avast has one of the largest threat detection networks in the cybersecurity industry. The attacks on these devices provide valuable insights and knowledge of the most prevalent threats and those who have been most affected by them.