In 2020, 75% of companies around the world experienced a phishing attack.
Phishing remains one of the biggest dangers to your business’s health and wellbeing because it’s the main delivery method for all types of cyberattacks.
One phishing email can be responsible for a company succumbing to ransomware and having to face costly downtime.
Phishing is a type of social engineering where an attacker sends a fraudulent message designed to trick a person into revealing sensitive information to the attacker or to deploy malicious software on the victim’s infrastructure like ransomware.
It can also lead a user to unknowingly hand over the credentials to a company email account that the hacker then uses to send targeted attacks to customers.
Phishing takes advantage of human error, and some phishing emails use sophisticated tactics to fool the recipient into divulging information or infecting a network with malware.
Mobile phishing threats skyrocketed by 161% in 2021.
Before you open an email check the following:
- Check the source – is it from a known contact with a legitimate email? Watch out for public domains (such as Gmail or Yahoo). Should it not be a business address?
- Are you expecting to hear from them, or is it unusual to be getting an email from them?
- If there are spelling errors, bad grammar and/or they address you generically
- You have not inherited money, won a prize or prepared to give financial assistance!
- Personal information should NOT be asked for via email
- Take nothing for face value… well known entities, logos and links can be suspect. Hover over links before you click and check web address and NEVER option attachments.