Electronics giant Apple becomes hackers favourite website to impersonate for phishing attacks in the first quarter of 2020.
Social engineers work around the clock inventing new and improved ways to steal, defraud and otherwise damage internet users. However, creating fake websites in order to steal user credentials is nothing new at all.
What is new, and demonstrates an interesting affect of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, is the shift from business-oriented to more personal and leisure-focused sites to impersonate.
Online browsing has taken more of a personal turn in the last few weeks as millions of users are furloughed or working from home. Hackers are fully aware of this and are doing what they can to profit from it.
Cyber-security specialists Check Point recently released their “Brand Phishing Report” for Q1 2020. It reveals that Apple has taken the number one spot as the most impersonated online brand, with Netflix following closely in second place.
This subtle shift in the phishing landscape demonstrates a solid necessity for security awareness training, and how that knowledge permeates both professional and personal life.
Now so many users are working from home, the line between professional grade cyber security practises and a more relaxed-at-home approach have become alarmingly thin.
“Cybercriminals continue to exploit users by adopting highly sophisticated phishing attempts via emails, web and mobile applications purporting to be from well-recognized brands which they know will be in high demand at the moment, whether that’s a high profile product launch or just generally tapping into behavioral changes we’ve seen during the coronavirus pandemic.”
Maya Horowitz – Product Director of Threat and Intelligence Research, Check Point
We urge all users with staff working from home to use this time to further test and educate them to the dangers of online scams.
As healthcare organisations continue to be targeted more than others Phishing Tackle are offering 3 months of unlimited access to our online security awareness training, simulated phishing and policy management platform to all global healthcare organisations.
To all other organisations we still offer a 14-day risk-free trial, along with several free tools to aid in the fight against cyber crime.
We understand that the first step towards cyber awareness is one of the hardest to take. One of our free tools reveals a very clear starting point, your organisation’s susceptibility to clicking on phishing emails. It is absolutely free and covers the most common phishing templates (including COVID-19 templates).
Whichever method you choose, choose something. Pandemic-themed phishing attacks have increased by over 600% and working from home introduces cyber-security risks that compound the hackers advantage over the average user.
