What a year 2020 has been. We have not even gotten half way into the year and we have dealt with a global pandemic, potential murder hornets, protests and riots and even the possibility of an over-active hurricane season.
If you haven’t done this in a while, now is a good time to take a deep breath and let some of the tension out. With all of the things going on, emotions are running high already and this can severely impact our ability to make good decisions. For those of us in the cybersecurity world, we know that times like these are a boon for cyber criminals. They use the heightened emotional level to scare or anger people into doing things they would not normally do, and the tactic is very effective.
Just this week, the NetWalker gang of cyber criminals hit the Austrian Village of Weiz with ransomware and started leaking information on the web. The attack vector that got them in was none other than COVID-19 related phishing emails. This same group also infected a hospital in Spain using the same technique -- email phishing.
As these events continue to unfold, it is important to understand that whenever there is a disaster, man-made or natural, the bad actors are ready and willing to use it to launch attacks. We can expect COVID-19 themed phishing emails to continue, but we can also expect to see attacks using the protests and riots as a theme as well. This is why in this time of stress and uncertainty, it has never been more important to ensure your defensive controls are working well and to step your employees through new-school security awareness training.
A great way to see how ready the employees are for an attack is to run a quick test with our free Phishing Security Test. This free test can help you understand if your human firewall is really ready to stand up to the continuing onslaught of phishing attacks, or if you need to work with them to better protect themselves and your organization during these crazy times.
