KnowBe4 Blog

Social Engineering

Latest social engineering news, analysis, tactics the bad guys are using and what you can do to defend your organization.

Identity Deception-Based Phishing Attacks Show an Increase in Impersonating Individuals

The use of impersonating a person or brand as part of an attack in on the rise, giving attackers the upper hand, establishing instant credibility and lowering the defenses of the ...

Phishing for Gamers Uses A Fake Skin Giveaway

BleepingComputer warns that a fake Steam skin giveaway site is stealing users’ Steam credentials. The site appears to be running a 26-day promotion giving away free skins for ...

Insecure Database Exposes Millions of Private SMS Messages

Researchers discovered an unprotected TrueDialog database hosted by Microsoft Azure with diverse and business-related data from tens of millions of users.

You Can’t Always Trust a Dot-Gov Domain

It may be easier than one thinks to register a dot-gov domain, according to KrebsOnSecurity. People have tended to regard urls with the top-level domain dot gov as generally reliable, but ...

Over Half of SMBs Experience Phishing and Social Engineering Attacks

The assertion that SMBs aren’t a cyber-target is officially dead. SMBs are victims of the very same attacks as enterprises in growing numbers, according to new research.

Insurers Get Serious About Social Engineering Attacks Citing a Lack of Awareness as the Problem

With specific endorsements to protect against social engineering scams, insurers are realizing where the true risk lies in cyberattacks and make recommendations of how to mitigate it.

Merchant fined for failing to train employees — Former NYDFS Superintendent Vullo Talks About Cybersecurity Regs

Mark Harrop, Director of Communications, Corporates at Thomson Reuters made me aware of a very interesting interview with Maria Vullo, the former Superintendent of New York’s Department ...

Phishing scams on the up in the Netherlands

Mina Solanki, an expat in Holland wrote: "After years of declining, phishing is on the up. In 2018, the (monetary) damage caused by it had almost quadrupled compared to previous years. ...

The Top Lesson From The Recent Louisiana 2,000-server Ransomware Infection: "User Education, User Education, User Education"

Louisiana suffered a ransomware attack last week that took down more than two thousand of the state’s computers and servers. The ransomware apparently entered the network after a user ...

Google Sent 12K Nation-State Phishing Warnings In Three Months

Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) delivered thousands of alerts of government-backed attempts to spearphish gmail users over just a three-month period earlier this year, they reported.