Fileless malware attacks are on the rise as more hackers use it to disguise their nefarious activities. These threats leverage a computer's existing, whitelisted applications and computing power against itself. This is what security professionals refer to as "live off the land" threats.

Fileless malware is an advanced, persistent threat that comes in the form of sneaky, signatureless attacks that can turn a computer against itself and compromise systems to steal information. This leaves no trace for security professionals to perform a forensic analysis to root out the cause.

Detections of fileless malware this year increased 265% compared to 2018's first half, according to Trend Micro's 2019 Midyear Security Roundup. The report also found that the most common uses of fileless malware came in the form of cryptocurrency mining malware, ransomware, and banking trojans.