Many people, especially professionals, like to think they can protect themselves against cyberattacks like phishing. Back in the day, it’s easier to tell legitimate emails from fake “you-won-a-million-dollars” spams that people can immediately trash at a glance.
Sharpening your awareness and honing your skills in distinguishing phishing attacks should increase your protection, especially for employees. We already got the ball rolling with our previous article that explores common phishing techniques, but cybercriminals constantly change up their game, so it’s worth knowing other ways they can fool you online.
1. Clone Phishing
Clone phishing presses the need to conduct team training to increase their alertness when handling emails. This is because it’s relatively easy to get tricked into believing close phishing attacks since the hacker often reviews the victim’s emails and replicates legitimate messages or conversations from their account.
The phisher often claims to “re-send” the email due to broken links, but they often swap out the verified links or attachments in the original email with malicious content.
2. Domain Spoofing
Gone are the days when phishers would attempt to directly reach their victims. While their cloning skills evolve, cyberattackers can now also recreate credible-looking domains in an attempt to “spoof” legitimate websites, emails, and more.
Increasing your awareness should clue you in onto the tell-tale signs that a website or email domain is fake, both of which you can primarily spot by analysing the URL or name. For example, the legitimate website URL of apple should be apple.com, while the spoof version may use “apple.co,” a minor tweak that can cause expensive damages when it slips your radar.
3. Watering Hole Phishing
The most dangerous threats are often the ones you can’t see, and phishers often take advantage of this “surprise attack” to catch their victims off-guard. They do this by infecting websites or links related to your company’s connections, be it from vendors, previous clients, and more.
Once one of your employees access a legitimate yet “ill” website, your computer will immediately get infected with the hidden malware. This can compromise your entire network and server right under your nose, but the worst part is that it can also transmit the virus to any other user who clicks on the “diseased” website.
The Bottom Line: Boosting Your Defense by Developing an Eye to Spot Phishing Attacks
In recent years, phishers design emails in a more sophisticated approach, masking behind a verified individual, agency, or organisation’s credibility. As cyberattacks become more prominent in this digital sphere, even established businesses can fall victim, leading to millions of dollars worth of losses.
The cybercrime industry is expected to cause damages worth $6 trillion in 2021, increasing the need to implement better cybersecurity measures.
If you want to secure your network and software against potential scammers, thieves, and other forms of cybercrime, we can protect your business from the damaging effects of online piracy and counterfeiting.
Our company offers advanced threat intelligence that can simplify your cyber analysis in more ways than one – from cyberattack prevention, anti-piracy solutions, and more. Get in touch with us today and see how we can guarantee your virtual safety.