Nearly everyone has been targeted by a phishing email at some point in time. Defined as the act of using messages, links, and appeals to trick or defraud a computer user by posing as a legitimate company, phishing most commonly occurs when a cybercriminal pretends to be someone or something they\u2019re not to try and steal something valuable.<\/p>\n
The most common form of phishing occurs when hackers \u201cspoof\u201d an email address, creating a fake account with the domain\u00a0yourcornpany.com<\/strong>\u2014which, at first glance, appears to be just like\u00a0yourcompany.com<\/strong>. Sometimes, phishers will include links to fake websites, legitimate-looking Word documents, PDF invoices, or delivery notifications to try and deliver a ransomware infection. Or, through the use of specific requests, a phishing email will try and convince you to share private account details or even initiate a wire transfer.<\/p>\n \u201cSpearphishing\u201d is even more dangerous. This advanced tactic typically finds cybercriminals trying to spoof an email address that appears to originate from a real person at your own company. Through social engineering and combing the Internet for publicly available details, hackers can figure out what you do for your job\u2014and where you fall in your company\u2019s chain of command\u2014to dangle specific information that can make a request seem even more real.<\/p>\n Other examples of phishing attempts that are commonly seen include:<\/strong><\/p>\n Consider these statistics that demonstrate the overwhelming growth of these types of phishing attempts:<\/strong><\/p>\n So how can you beat these odds and protect your information, your digital identity, and your company?<\/strong>\u00a0CMIT Solutions has compiled the following recommendations:<\/p>\n 1. Look for misspellings in email addresses, subject lines, and body copy.<\/strong>\u00a0Poor grammar and unfamiliar headers are telltale signs of a phishing attempt. Always click to review the details of a sender\u2019s name, email account, and domain name from which the message is sent. Also, proceed with caution if you see unusual phrasings or misspellings in the subject line, uncommon greetings (\u201cHello Madam\u201d or \u201cGood Day Sir\u201d) in the body copy, or anything that produces an unnecessary sense of urgency. If an email from a co-worker asks you to do something right away, call, text, or video chat with that person in real life to confirm the request.<\/p>\n 2. Use multi-factor authentication to verify that a request to change or confirm account information is real.<\/strong>\u00a0If you receive a link that purports to come from Gmail or Amazon, say, navigate directly to those apps and log in using MFA\u2014which entails entering your password and then a unique code typically delivered via text message\u2014to check and see whether the request is real.<\/p>\n 3. Manually retype the address of any website you want to visit\u2014don\u2019t just click the link!<\/strong>\u00a0If anything in an email gives you pause, the first step is to NOT CLICK ANY LINK CONTAINED WITHIN IT. It\u2019s easy for hackers to shield the destination of a link that may look normal. For instance, it may say \u201camazon.com,\u201d but it\u2019ll really point to \u201camason.com.\u201d Or, if you hover over the link with your mouse and the yellow box that pops up includes long strings of random characters, proceed with caution. The safest method of visiting any website is to manually type the URL you want to visit so you are in full control of where your browser takes you.<\/p>\n 4. Do not share private information in the body of an email.<\/strong>\u00a0Even if you know the sender with whom you\u2019re communicating, it\u2019s always safer to avoid including any personally identifiable information in an email. That goes for login credentials, passwords, birthdays, phone numbers, account numbers, and even physical addresses. Be wary of any message that asks for such data\u2014especially if it makes repeated requests.<\/p>\n 5. Do not open any attachment that you aren\u2019t expecting.<\/strong>\u00a0Illicit attachments sent with legitimate-looking emails is one of the most common ways that hackers try to infect computers and steal data. Whether it\u2019s a ZIP file, a PDF, an MP3, a Word document, or an Excel spreadsheet, DO NOT CLICK ANYTHING you aren\u2019t specifically expecting. Clicking on one attachment just one time can unleash dangerous computer viruses or install debilitating ransomware that can lock up your computer and your network within seconds.<\/p>\n Phishing continues to be a serious problem because humans aren\u2019t perfect\u2014and because the average worker writes, sends, and responds to more than 100 emails per day. If we see a message that looks like it\u2019s from a trusted colleague, it\u2019s easy to let our guard down. If that email asks for help, we\u2019ll often respond quickly. And if we know what a phishing attempt is, we\u2019ll never fall for one, right?<\/p>\n You can make a difference by learning more about the obvious signs of phishing emails, while stronger standards for email security can make a big difference for your company. Learning to take an extra second and confirm an email\u2019s origin and intent can save you from serious cyber danger (not to mention losing a lot of money).<\/p>\n At the end of the day, if you have any doubts, mark any suspicious email as junk or spam and contact a trusted IT provider immediately. If you have questions about the nature of phishing emails, the rise in online scams, or the specific threats that your company faces,\u00a0contact CMIT Solutions today<\/a>. We protect thousands of clients across North America from hundreds of cyber threats every day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 5 Ways to Stay Vigilant and Protect Your Information Nearly everyone has…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":77,"featured_media":4981,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-quick-tips"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/77"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cmitsolutions.com\/clearlake-tx-1106\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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