KnowBe4 Blog

Keeping you informed. Keeping you aware.
Stay on top of the latest in human and agent security including social and prompt engineering, ransomware and phishing attacks.

Stu Sjouwerman

Founder and Executive Chairman

Stu Sjouwerman (pronounced “shower-man”) is the Founder and Executive Chairman of KnowBe4, Inc., which hosts the world’s most popular integrated security awareness training and simulated phishing platform, with over 54,000 organization customers and more than 50 million users. A serial entrepreneur and data security expert with 30 years in the IT industry, Stu was the co-founder of Inc. 500 company Sunbelt Software, a multiple award-winning anti-malware software company that was acquired in 2010.


Recent Posts

New Type of Spear Phishing Directly Targeted at IT Pros

A member of the SpiceWorks IT forums reported he had received a new type of hybrid attack: first a phone call to his desk, followed up with a phishing email laced with malware, promoting ...

Scam Of The Week: Nasty Two-factor Auth Text Hack

We all know that two-factor authentication (2FA) is much better than just simple user/password credentials. However, there is a nasty spoofing trick that bypasses 2FA if the user does not ...

Individual ransomware payments skyrocket to a whopping $20,000

Heads-up! Individual ransomware payments are getting very expensive. Companies are stockpiling Bitcoin in case they are hit, and a new low-profile strain of ransomware is actually causing ...

Yikes: Ransomware scam targets lawyers with phony ethics complaints

Mike Mosedale at the Minnesota Lawyer wrote: "Talk about your dirty tricks. A new internet scam is targeting lawyers by exploiting one of their great fears: getting slapped with a ...

Scam Of The Week: FBI Warns Against Email Extortion

Your employees are being attacked both inside and outside the office. This new email extortion scam called CEO fraud can hit in both places, so it makes sense to warn them about this ...

UltraDeCrypter Ransomware DOES NOT Decrypt Your Files

KnowBe4 gets regular calls from system admins who found us on the internet that are between a rock and a hard place. Backups failed and they have no way to revert to normal files. Worse, ...

[ALERT] 93% of phishing attacks now have ransomware payloads

Oh boy. Things have gotten from bad to worse in an awful hurry. I remember the first time I reported on ransomware in the CyberheistNews Issue Feb 11, 2014, where an attorney's office ...

Looks Like 8 More Cyberheists By North Koreans

Gottfried Leibbrandt, chief executive of the world’s largest interbank funds-transfer system SWIFT, has said repeatedly that the prospect of cybercrime is what keeps him awake at night. ...

[INFOGRAPHIC] Don't Be The Victim Of A Cyberheist

We have created a new infographic for your users, as part of your ongoing security awareness training program. It's a few good reminders how to stay safe online, and to keep their ...

Top Ransomware campaign managers make 13 times more than avg Russian wages

A short report by Flashpoint gives us some insight into a recent ransomware campaign, which so far has generated a serious amount of profit considering it takes little effort to operate.

Phishing Attacks Ramp Into 2016 With Major Increase

In its most recent Phishing Trends Report, the APWG noted a 250% increase in phishing sites between October 2015 and March 2016 — and the 2016 increase shows the never ending criminal ...

Ransomware domains increased 3500% in Q1 2016

There has been a whopping 3500% increase in ransomware domains in the first quarter of 2016, compared to the last quarter of 2015. Those are the highlights of a new report by network ...

CEO And CFO Fired After Aerospace Company Grounded By CEO Fraud

Here is a great way for C-level execs to lose their job: allow your company to become the victim of CEO Fraud. That happened to the CEO and CFO of FACC, part of both Airbus' and Boeings' ...

CryptoWall, Locky, and Cerber Are Today's Top 3 Ransomware Threats

US cyber-security firm Fortinet reports that, between April 1, 2016, and May 15, 2016, the top five most prevalent ransomware families were in this order: CryptoWall (41.04%), Locky ...

New Strain Of Cerber Ransomware Being Offered As RaaS On Russian Hacking Forum

Security Researchers at Forcepoint discovered that a Russian hacking forum on the dark web is selling the Cerber ransomware as a RaaS (Ransom-as-a-service). This is a new form since ...

Are North Koreans The Bad Guys Behind Brazen Cyberheists?

In March, we posted a story about a cyberheist where hackers tried to steal a cool 1 Billion dollars from the Bangladesh Central Bank, but a simple typo thwarted most of their attempt. ...

The Nightmare of Exploits Past. How Phishing Attacks Use Old Vulnerabilities

By Eric Howes, KnowBe4's Principal Lab Researcher Remember .PIF files? If you're like us, the extension probably rings a bell somewhere deep in the dustiest recesses of your mind -- the ...

Scam Of The Week: Summer Olympics Canceled in Rio

Heads-up! There is a spike in phishing attacks with Summer Olympics themes, and in the coming months the bad guys are going to be all over this. Kaspersky Labs researchers are reporting ...