Thales 2023 Data Threat Report: The Increased Telco Cybersecurity Challenges in the 5G Era

Telecommunications firms have always faced a unique set of security challenges. The rapid shift to higher levels of digitization has meant they have much more dispersed infrastructure and data to protect. The substantial changes in the 5G ecosystem bring new dimensions to the telecom threat landscape and opportunities for malicious actors to exploit network security vulnerabilities. The Thales 2023 Data Threat Report, Telecommunications Edition findings reinforce the critical need for telco enterprises to step up their cyber protection practices and rethink the tools and processes they use to transform and strengthen their security capabilities.

The latest edition of the report explores the perspectives of over 100 telecom respondents in 18 countries on their understanding of the threat landscape, challenges, and strategies in data protection in 5G and infrastructure areas like the cloud.

The 5G challenges

The virtual 5G network brings exponential speed, latency, and reach improvements, and with it comes new business opportunities and unique technical challenges. According to the GSMA, the world’s telcos will spend around $1 trillion on 5G launches. A cloud-native 5G turns (mainly) physical network components into software to connect subscribers in previously remote locations, support billions of IoT devices, and slice up bandwidth for enterprises to run their private networks.

However, telcos are facing further challenges around protecting the subscribers’ privacy and safeguarding the integrity, availability, and performance of the virtual 5G networks. If industry and consumers are excited about 5G, so are cybercriminals. On 3G and 4G, network functions resided on hardware platforms. This physical isolation provided a level of protection. The virtualization of the 5G network means data is no longer stored centrally, which gives attackers more chances to intercept it.

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