The Gist
Getting fishy emails from a trusted source asking for personal information? Well before you hit send, stop and ask could this be a socially engineered phishing attack?
These days, scammers have crafted so many new techniques for evading cyber security that to some it has become a form of art. With the introduction of social engineering, hackers have learned to tap into human behavior and manipulate it so that important security information will be given freely. By playing on people’s willingness to be helpful, hackers can breach high-end companies with methods as shockingly simple as a standard email.
So what is this pebble that can take down our goliath corporations so easily? According to recent popular social engineering attacks, our culprit is known as phishing. A phishing attack can occur when an attacker delivers a fraudulent email claiming to be from a legitimate source. Often requesting personal security information, unsuspecting recipients openly click links that contain malware or worse, share disclosed information.
Although phishing attacks can be difficult to detect, they are simple to prevent. Security awareness is the immediate and natural solution for fighting and overall preventing against social engineering attacks. With the knowledge of what to avoid, people can make the educated decisions to keep their company and private information safe. According to security experts, personal information should never be transferred in an un-encrypted format. By encouraging IT departments to hold regular assessments of their computer systems, you can detect vulnerabilities before attackers can utilize them.
Rather than eating the cost of breaches and attacks, we are in a technological age where there are far more preemptive solutions. Don’t compromise the personal information of your employees. At Affant we provide security network solutions to ensure the safety of your company. With 24/7 monitoring and reporting, Affant will be there so you won’t have to pay for a pricy reply.
Resources: zdnet.com
Affant Director of Engineering since 2000. Management of engineering and support team, Escalation of all technical and client issues. Sales and design engineer.
