The breakneck speed of going digital during the Covid-19 pandemic could have created opportunities for hackers to plant more malware in Internet-connected devices such as computers and seize control of them.

Such "zombie" devices that crooks can use to carry out cyber attacks tripled in Singapore last year, the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore said yesterday. A daily average of 6,600 such malware-laced devices were observed here last year.

The number of cases of ransomware also more than doubled to 89 cases here last year.