New Delhi, May 23 : In the first quarter of 2021, the number of DDoS attacks dropped by 29 per cent compared to the same period in 2020, but increased by 47 per cent compared to the fourth quarter in 2020, says a report. However, this growth is explained by an unusual spike in January, that month accounted for 43 per cent of all attacks in the quarter, while the other two months remained quiet, as per Kaspersky DDoS Prevention. "A reduction in the number of DDoS attacks is definitely good news for companies, however, it shouldn't mean that they can relax their security efforts," Chris Connell, Managing Director, Kaspersky (APAC), said in a statement. "A DDoS attack is still a serious threat to businesses, especially in APAC, but an increase in corporate awareness coupled with Internet security software enhancements can help reduce the sheer number of attacks," Connell added. At the beginning of 2021, many people were still working remotely and spending their leisure time at home. Therefore, cybercriminals conducted DDoS attacks against entities that users need more, for example, telecom providers, so that their clients experienced issues with their internet connection or online gaming sites. Nevertheless, despite the remaining attention on such resources, statistics show the overall DDoS situation is becoming stable. Kaspersky experts explain the drop in attacks compared to the same quarter of the last year by the abnormal activity at the beginning of 2020. Because of a sudden shift to remote work, corporate VPN gateways and web resources, such as mail or corporate knowledge bases, which were previously available only inside an organisation, became a target for DDoS attacks. Within the year, businesses mostly implemented protection for these parts of IT infrastructure, the report said. Given this, attacks against these web assets may have become less effective and the number of DDoS attacks dropped. So, by February and March 2021 the number of attacks returned to a pre-lockdown benchmark. /IANS