social engineering Archives

Phishing and Social Engineering Simulations

Posted on December 14, 2023December 20, 2023 by Mike

Businesses have explored many approaches to educating their staff members about phishing and social engineering. However, even now, human error remains the primary cause of over 90% of data breaches. Not much has changed in the last five years! Just how difficult is learning? Maybe there’s a better training program we can employ.

While traditional classroom training is effective for presenting concepts, it is not the ideal method for ensuring employees learn these concepts and can apply them in real-world situations. A better approach must exist, such as role-playing activities that promote critical thinking when confronted with a real-life phishing or social engineering threat.

Ten Proficiencies Developed through Simulation Practices

Through realistic simulations, your staff can gain competencies that will improve the security of your company. Your staff can profit from simulation exercises in the following 10 ways:

Detection of Phishing and Social Engineering Attempts

Understanding the appearance of phishing emails is the first line of defense against them. Hackers will usually disguise them to resemble the real thing. Still, there will always be indicators to alert you that these download requests, links, or even straightforward email messages are not to be trusted.

Knowledge of Safe Online Conduct

You shouldn’t browse the internet carelessly because your machine has built-in anti-malware technology. Take precautions every time you use the internet to keep yourself safe. Some helpful precautions include using only https websites, avoiding public Wi-Fi, and turning off the auto-fill feature in forms.

Developing Robust Passwords To Prevent Phishing and Social Engineering Attacks

We are aware of how crucial it is to use secure passwords for every account. Many employees forget, maybe because there are so many passwords they need to remember. Exercises that simulate password cracking can show how simple hackers can find a password. Seeing this would successfully lead the lecture and instruct participants to create complicated, lengthy passwords. Using an effective password manager and multi-factor authentication can also help.

Utilizing Social Media Caution

A typical person uses social media for 2.5 hours per day. This is a long period during which cyber predators can easily target you. Adopting safety measures such as restricting the sharing of private information, avoiding dubious apps, and exercising general awareness, you can reduce the danger.

Use caution when downloading files.

There’s no space for complacency—even files from reliable sources can contain viruses. You must develop the practice of scanning all files before downloading them and never open files from senders you are unfamiliar with.

Using Data Encryption on Phishing and Social Engineering

These days, data communication is so commonplace that some people overlook the need for security. It is more important than ever to employ the most innovative tools and to safeguard any devices used for these transfers to keep all data transfers as safe as possible.

Making Use of Physical Security on Phishing and Social Engineering

Don’t neglect physical security procedures, even though cybersecurity needs to be a top priority. Through simulation, you may witness how easy it is for a hacker to access a system through an unattended device or how simple it is to pass through an unguarded building entry point.

Sustaining Distance Security

Cybercriminals may gain access to the organization’s network if employees use public Wi-Fi for work-related purposes. Among the subjects covered by simulation exercises should be home network security, using VPNs safely, and public hotspot safety procedures.

Preventing Malware Threats

A fantastic technique to teach staff members to minimize malware threats is through phishing simulation. They will learn through these exercises what not to do, which can improve their chances of staying safe in real life.

Taking Charge of Intriguing Activities

Ultimately, social engineering and phishing simulation exercises will instruct staff members on what to do if they fall victim to a cyberattack. Besides spotting attacks, there will be guidelines on reporting verified incidents.

Has your data been hacked? Download our Infographic, “The Top 10 steps to take if you think you have been hacked.” If you’d like, call us and we can talk about how we can customize data security for your unique needs!

Educating Your Staff to Spot Social Engineering

Posted on November 16, 2023November 16, 2023 by Mike

One of the newest techniques used by hackers to gain private data is social engineering. This method uses human psychology to gather data rather than simply attacking a system. When you consider it, this approach is quite brilliant because it avoids having to go through strict network security. Someone will literally hand the information to the hackers on a silver platter if they can trick even one employee, and they will take over the organization’s entire system. That is why it is important to train your employees on how to spot social engineering.

Businesses need to be aware of how social engineering can seriously jeopardize security. Over 90% of data breaches, according to reports, result from social engineering. Of these cases, 54% involve phishing scams. The good news is that you can avoid most social engineering threats by training your staff members.

Common Social Engineering Methods

There is a lot to cover when teaching employees how to spot social engineering. Discussing the most common strategies would be a reasonable place to start so that staff members can identify and steer clear of them.

The most popular technique is phishing because it is simple to carry out. It produces incredibly fruitful outcomes, at least for the hackers. This technique involves sending emails that trick recipients into clicking a harmful link or disclosing private information without realizing it.

Pretexting is when a hacker manipulates a pretext or made-up scenario to acquire the victim’s trust as part of a more complex social engineering attack strategy. The hacker might trick the victim into disclosing information for something in the quid pro quo attack. Another common way to spot social engineering involves tailgating or piggybacking, in which the victim unwittingly grants the hacker access to a secure site.

Training of Employees is Important to Spot Social Engineering

As you can expect, if your staff wasn’t properly trained or aware of the hazards to spot them, these social engineering tactics would be considerably simpler to implement. The $100 million phishing fraud on Google and Facebook is an example of the immense harm that could result. A group of hackers repeatedly sent phishing emails from 2013 to 2015 to Google and Facebook workers, instructing them to deposit money into phony accounts. Through this technique, they could gain more than $100 million.

Now, even if your company doesn’t bring in that much money, you can still fall victim. Hackers attack small firms on a large scale these days. Every employee of your company, from customer service representatives to top executives, might be a target, so you need to implement training across the board.

Best Practices to Spot Social Engineering for Employees

There are various ways to teach your staff about how to spot social engineering. A thorough training session works best in a traditional classroom setting, whether in person or online. But a single seminar is not sufficient, which is why we also advise frequent refreshers.

Unannounced phishing simulations are excellent for gauging how much a worker has learned. You’d be astonished at how many individuals perform admirably in theory but cannot recognize the truth when it is staring them in the face in their email. Your staff will learn to be more watchful going forward after experiencing being bitten during a simulated attack.

Final Reflections

If everyone in the organization is adequately aware of the risks and knows what to do if an attack is successful, organizations can attain a high level of protection against social engineering. Along with the many training techniques you’ll use, we strongly suggest that you download our infographic, “The Top 10 Steps to Take If You Think You Have Been Hacked.” Post it on the bulletin boards in each department by printing it out. Ensure that every member of your staff receives a copy as well.

Call us if you’d like to learn more about how to spot social engineering and how to prevent becoming a victim. We can keep your business safe from the prying eyes of cybercriminals and bring you up to speed on the most recent preventive measures.

The Biggest Cybersecurity Threats of 2023

Posted on July 24, 2023July 21, 2023 by CT Team

As the world becomes an increasingly tech-reliant place, the threat of cybercrime continues to grow. Cybersecurity threats can come from a variety of places and at various scales. From nation-states and terrorist groups to individual hackers, there’s no end to the possible sources of cybersecurity threats. In this blog, we’ll discuss the common sources and types of cybersecurity threats and break down how you can stay protected in a scary digital world.

Common Sources of Cybersecurity Threats

Cybersecurity threats come from many different sources. They can range from individual attacks to large government-run operations from hostile countries. Here are a few common sources of cybersecurity threats that could impact your organization:

Nation-States: Foreign nations with hostile intentions may use sophisticated technologies to infiltrate local institutions and cause chaos, disrupting communication channels and causing irreversible harm in the process. The potential consequences of such attacks cannot be overstated, and it is up to individuals and organizations to remain vigilant and take proactive measures to safeguard their online assets.
Terrorist Organizations: In the realm of modern warfare, terrorists have devised a new means of destruction – cyber attacks. These attacks are typically aimed at crippling vital infrastructure, wreaking havoc on economies, threatening national security, and even endangering the lives and well-being of innocent citizens.
Criminal Groups: Sophisticated gangs of cybercriminals are exploiting advanced tactics to infiltrate computer systems with the intent of reaping economic rewards. Through a combination of phishing, spamming, and malware, these nefarious organizations are stealing private data, perpetrating online scams, and extorting their victims. Even the most vigilant digital security measures can be compromised, leading to potentially dire consequences for individuals and businesses alike.
Hackers: The threat of individuals targeting organizations through hacking techniques is an ongoing concern. Driven by a variety of motives, including personal gain, financial profit, or political activism, hackers often seek to bring chaos to the digital world. In the quest to improve their skills and reputation within the hacker community, these individuals continually develop new and innovative ways to cause harm to their targets.
Malicious Insiders: Insider threats refer to an enemy within, wreaking havoc from right under the organization’s nose. These sly attackers are individuals who have legitimate access to a company’s assets but choose to abuse their privileges to either steal information or cause damage to the computing systems. Insiders can come in different forms, including employees, contractors, suppliers, or even partners of the target organization, and in some cases, intruders who have hacked into privileged accounts and are masquerading as the account owner.

Common Types of Cybersecurity Threats

As technology and security measures advance, so do the ways in which cybersecurity threats are carried out. Here are some of the most common types of cybersecurity threats in 2023:

Malware Attacks: Malware covers a range of malicious software, including viruses, worms, trojans, spyware, and ransomware, all designed to infiltrate and wreak havoc on computer systems. These dangerous programs can enter your systems through links on untrusted websites or emails or through the download of unwanted software. Once inside, malware can manipulate and block access to important network components, as well as collect sensitive data and even shut down entire systems.
Social Engineering Attacks: Social engineering attacks involve tricking unsuspecting users into letting them in by posing as a trustworthy source. The results can be devastating, leaving the victim with compromised security and potential malware lurking on their device. Some of the most common examples of social engineering attacks include: baiting, pretexting, phishing or spear-phishing, piggybacking, and tailgating.
Supply Chain Attacks: Supply chain attacks are a new and dangerous form of cyberthreat, exploiting legitimate applications to spread malware via source code or update mechanisms. Attackers target insecure network protocols, server infrastructure and coding techniques in order to compromise build processes, modify the software’s source code without detection from vendors and stealthily conceal malicious content.

Cybersecurity Solutions That Work

At FIT Solutions, we understand that the ever-changing landscape of cybersecurity threats can seem daunting. With a wide array of sources and types of threats, it can seem like everyone is out to get you. That’s why you need the team of experts at FIT Solutions on your side. Our cybersecurity solutions will help keep your organization safe and give you the peace of mind you’re looking for. Contact us today to learn more about how we can protect you from cybersecurity threats.