BENGALURU: With an increase in the number of cloud gaming platforms and their growing popularity, cyberattacks on player accounts and gaming companies too have augmented in the past year.
Web application attacks have grown by 167%, and gaming remains the industry most hit by DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks, accounting for 37% of all DDoS traffic observed globally, says a recent report by cloud company Akami Technologies.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Akamai has recorded an increase of 150% in traffic peaks, culminating in April this year.
"The influx of new users, as well as existing users who continue to spend money on games, making the gaming industry an even more lucrative target for cybercriminals," it said.
According to Allied Market Research, the cloud gaming market reached $244 million in 2020, and is expected to reach nearly $21.54 billion by 2030.
After the US and Switzerland, India is the third main target for attackers.
According to Tracxn, India has 1,034 gaming start-ups such as MPL, e-sports and mobile gaming platforms and Games 24x7.
In addition to the cost of the games, gamers also spend liberally on things such as tool and character upgrades, and this is the highly lucrative world of microtransactions, the report stated. Between July and September 2020, Activision Blizzard, an American video game company, raked in $1.5 billion from microtransactions alone.
According to a report from The Business Research Company, the online microtransaction market is expected to reach $106.02 billion in 2026 at a CAGR of 11.9%.
While the growth of cloud gaming seems to have a bright future, its expansion will also increase the game industry’s overall attack surface.
"The growth of other lucrative aspects of the gaming industry will continue to attract bad actors. Microtransactions, for example, represent a huge draw for criminals who can capitalise on the spending power of gamers and the fungible nature of virtual assets," the report added.