Mideast, African Hackers Target Gov'ts, Banks, Small Retailers

Dark Reading reports that in the Middle East and Africa, hackers targeting governments, finance, and small retailers are part of a broader MEA threat landscape exposed by SOCRadar. Between September 2024 and September 2025, the public sector was the most targeted industry in the region, with finance and IT also prominent, while retail attacks—phishing, data extortion, and other cybercrimes against stores selling clothing and baby foods—ranked in the top five.

The analysis notes unusual patterns, including that 71.4% of 2025 MEA ransomware attacks were carried out by smaller groups, one-off operations, or actors largely unknown to the industry. Retail breaches can involve high-volume data, such as a Dark Web post advertising data from 57,548 stolen orders for an Egyptian baby food e-store, as well as 259GB of data allegedly stolen from shopping malls in Israel.

The article highlights that many attacks against retailers are financially motivated and that small to medium retailers often struggle to implement costly security measures, making them attractive targets for quick cash or ransom payments. Nate Nelson, the contributing writer, frames these findings within a regional context where hacktivism and disruption of services coexist with financially driven threats.