Study Shows 30 Pct Of Malaysian Public-Listed Companies Face High Likelihood Of Being Hacked

KUALA LUMPUR, March 25 (Bernama) -- About 30 per cent of Malaysian public-listed companies assessed in LGMS Bhd’s latest study have shown a “cyber risk posture associated with a high likelihood of being hacked if specifically targeted.”

“This underscored the need for greater urgency among Malaysian PLCs to strengthen their cyber defences,” it said in a statement today.

LGMS is a Malaysian cybersecurity consulting firm established in 2005 to provide independent assessments, penetration testing, compliance audits, and advisory services.

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LGMS’s finding was based on 54 companies that received an ‘F’ rating from a sample of 186 assessed.

It said the study was based on a non-intrusive, outside-in assessment of 186 listed companies selected by top revenue sizes within their respective industry sectors.  It used publicly available commercial and open source internet data to evaluate each company’s visible cyber posture from a hacker’s perspective.

LGMS’s score summary showed that only 26 companies received an ‘A’ rating and 46 a ‘B’ rating, while 33 were rated ‘C’, 27 ‘D’, and 54 ‘F’. In total, 114 of the 186 listed companies assessed fell below the top two rating bands, pointing to a broad room for improvement in terms of external cyber resilience.

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Companies rated ‘A’ were described as having relatively limited visible exposure, while ‘F’-rated entities were described as having a very large attack surface and a high likelihood of suffering successful unauthorised access if specifically targeted.

“F-rated entities are 13.8 times more likely to be breached compared with A-rated entities,” LGMS said. “The comparable multiples were 2.9 times for B-rated entities, 5.4 times for C-rated entities, and 9.2 times for D-rated entities.”

LGMS noted that many of the visible findings in the lower-rated group appeared to stem from websites and servers, indicating that internet-facing systems remain a significant point of weakness for many organisations.

“Some cases may show signs of suspicious activity, although the outside-in methodology provides only high-level visibility rather than full internal forensics,” it said. “The findings indicate that a sizeable portion of Malaysia’s listed companies may still have a visible attack surface that could be exploited if left unaddressed.”

“Hence, the responsible course is to identify those weaknesses early, reduce unnecessary exposure and strengthen safeguards before hackers take advantage of them,” it added.

LGMS said it welcomes inquiries from public-listed companies interested in understanding their external cyber risk posture and that it would share relevant findings to help them identify potential areas for improvement.

-- BERNAMA