In a new report published by the US-Japanese cybersecurity company Trend Micro, the company claims that the metaverse has more and more vulnerabilities that could materialize in the next three to five years.
According to Trend Micro, the main threats to the metaverse, especially from a regulatory point of view, are the security problems of NFTs, the development of a “Darkverse” similar to the dark web, financial fraud, privacy issues, physical threats , augmented reality threats, social engineering, and traditional cyberattacks.
Regarding NFTs, Trend Micro specifically wrote:
“Ownership of NFTs is verified by the blockchain, which is susceptible to blockchain hijacking attacks. NFTs that rely on smaller blockchains could be vulnerable to a Sybil attack, where the attacker gains control of more than 50 % of peer nodes that verify transactions and thus can manipulate NFT ownership verification Lastly, a metaverse space may not honor the ownership declared in the NFT, as there is no legal reason to do so “.
The company also believes that criminal groups could be attracted to the metaverse world due to the sheer volume of e-commerce transactions.. “In the metaverse, we are likely to see more pump-and-dump schemes. Malicious actors will increase the value of digital assets through fake recommendations, endorsements, and investments, and then dump the assets.” As in theory, the valuation of virtual land is highly perception-dependent and could be open to manipulation.
Finally, Trend Micro believes that law enforcement agencies could struggle during the first two years of metaverse development due to the high cost of intercepting digital crimes and criminals at scale.. They will also have difficulties because jurisdiction is difficult to establish. The time needed to create metaverse lore would also mean that this class of crime could go largely unguarded in the early years.
“If a user is scammed or robbed, getting help, filing complaints or taking legal action will be very difficult. The user will also be using decentralized digital currencies, which adds complexity to the situation.”
In the end, the report calls for adequate security models to be developed in anticipation of a large influx of investment in the sector. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, has recently said that the metaverse is an opportunity that could unlock “trillions of dollars” over time.
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