KnowBe4 Blog

Social Engineering

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

Kaspersky: Use of New QakBot Banking Trojan that Steals Emails Up 65%

Representing a new evolution of banking trojan, QakBot proves to be a formidable adversary against security defenses with its’ ability to steal emails – your users.

Over $100,000,000 Lost to Romance Scams in Seven Months

People in the US lost $133,400,000 to romance scams between January 1st and July 31st of 2021, according to the FBI. The average amount lost was in the tens of thousands of dollars. The ...

Enterprise Organizations Have as Much as an 85% Chance of Receiving a BEC Attack Every Week

Business Email Compromise is a multi-billion dollar business, representing 43% of all cybercrime last year. Despite it being dwarfed in the news by ransomware, it represents a growing ...

Researchers Discover Vulnerability Used for Deception and SSID Stripping

Researchers at AirEye have discovered a vulnerability in the way in which devices connect to wireless networks that could allow an attacker to trick a user into connecting to a malicious ...

Social Media as Artillery Preparation for Spear Phishing

Researchers at ESTsecurity warn that a North Korean threat actor known as “Kumsong 121” is using compromised social media accounts to launch spear phishing attacks, the Daily NK reports. ...

Business Email Compromise Scam takes New Hampshire Town for $2.3 Million

Social engineering is at the heart of this attack, where scammers successfully tricked a town into redirecting not just one but several bank transfers.

Blame it on the Lizard Brain

People need to work to overcome their inherent biases in order to avoid falling for social engineering attacks, according to Heidi Mitchell at the Wall Street Journal.

5 Ways to Recognize Social Engineering

Social engineering can come in many different forms: via email, websites, voice calls, SMS messages, social media and even fax. If it is a communication method, scammers and criminals are ...

BEC and the Underworld's Resources

Researchers at Intel 471 have observed cybercriminals outsourcing talent for business email compromise (BEC) attacks. This tactic lowers the bar of entry for BEC attacks, which are ...

Cybercriminals Can Post Jobs on LinkedIn Posing as Any Employer They Want

Lax verification around what company is offering a given job on LinkedIn allows attackers to create bogus job postings for malicious purposes.