- In today’s environment, social engineering attacks are prevalent and increasing. The human element is often the weakest component in a company’s security. Attackers know this and exploit it.
- Criminals who use phishing tactics are successful because they carefully conceal themselves behind emails and websites that the intended victim is familiar with.
- Phishing is a type of cybercrime that involves the use of deceptive emails, websites, and text messages to steal sensitive personal and corporate information.
TYPES OF PHISHING
Content Injection
A familiar website, like an email account login page or online banking page is injected with malicious content. This can include a link, form, or pop-up that directs users to a secondary website where they are prompted to confirm personal information, update credit card information, and change passwords.
An email is sent to multiple recipients that appears to come from a legitimate source, urging them to update personal information, verify account details or change a password. The email is usually written with a sense of urgency and the need for the recipient to protect themselves from crime.
Link Manipulation
A carefully worded email arrives with a malicious link to a familiar website such as Amazon or another popular website. When the link is clicked, it takes people to a fake website designed to look exactly like the known website where they are prompted to update their account information or verify account details.
CEO Fraud
Sending emails that appear to be from the CEO, human resources, or a colleague is a common type of domain spoofing. The email may request that the recipient send funds, confirm an e-transfer or wire transfer, or send tax information.
Fake Websites
Hackers create fake websites that look exactly like popular websites. This bogus website has a slightly different domain, such as outlook.you.live.com instead of outlook.live.com. People mistakenly believe they are on the correct website and thus expose themselves to identity theft.
Mobile Phishing
Mobile phishing can involve fraudulent SMS, social media, voice mail or other in-app messages that inform the recipient their account has been closed, compromised or expiring. The message includes a link, video or message aimed at stealing personal information or installing malware on the mobile device.
Voice Phishing
With voice phishing or vishing, a phone caller leaves a strongly worded voicemail or reads from a script that urges the recipient to call another phone number. These calls are frequently intended to be urgent in order to persuade the recipient to act before their bank account is suspended or they are charged with a crime. Sometimes it acts to be a service provider urging you to recharge your phone immediately or the services will be shut urging the victim to share their credit card details.
PURPOSE OF A DMARC REPORT
Learn about all of the email sources used by your company.
TOP 2 FUNCTIONS OF DMARC
Authenticates messages (DMARC alignment)
When SPF or DKIM checks the message, DMARC passes or fails it based on whether the message’s From: header matches the sending domain. This is known as alignment. So, before configuring DMARC for your domain, you should enable SPF and DKIM.
Manages messages that fail authentication (receiver policy)
If a message from your domain fails the SPF or DKIM checks (or both), DMARC instructs the server on what to do with the message.
- When receiving mail servers receive a message that appears to be from your organisation but fails authentication checks or does not meet the authentication requirements in your DMARC policy record, DMARC instructs them on what to do. Unauthenticated messages could be impersonating your organisation or coming from unauthorised servers.
- DMARC is always used in conjunction with the following two email authentication methods or checks:
- The Sender Policy Framework (SPF) allows the domain owner to authorise IP addresses that can send email for the domain.
- Receiving servers can verify that messages appearing to come from a specific domain are sent from servers allowed by the domain owner.
- DKIM (Domain Keys Identified Mail) adds a digital signature to every message sent. Receiving servers use the signature to ensure that messages are authentic and have not been forged or altered during transit
ADVANTAGES OF DMARC:
- Gain visibility into their email channel to determine whether their domains are being used legitimately or fraudulently.
- Improve their email reputation and trustworthiness overall.
- Ensure legitimate email is getting delivered and fraudulent email is not.
- Receive alerts when changes to email infrastructure may impact the delivery of legitimate messages.
- Identify sources and forms of threat so that they’re equipped to proactively prevent attacks.
WHAT MAKES DMARC RELIABLE?
- User-friendly overviews grouped on several values
- Learn about phishing attacks targeting your name.
- Unlimited users, domains and domain groups
- Receive daily/weekly reports
- Two-Factor Authentication
- The DNS timeline allows you to keep track of DNS changes and updates.
- Create and check DMARC records
MODERN PHISHING PROBLEMS REQUIRE DMARC SOLUTIONS
- DMARC not only provides full visibility into email channels, but it also highlights phishing attacks.
- DMARC is more powerful and is capable of mitigating the impact of phishing and malware attacks, preventing spoofing, protecting against brand abuse, scams and avoiding business email compromise.
Configuring DMARC correctly assists receiving mail servers in determining how to evaluate messages claiming to be from your domain, and it is one of the most important steps you can take to improve deliverability.
HOW DOES PHISHING HAPPEN?
Phishing occurs when an unwitting victim responds to fraudulent requests for action. This action can include downloading an attachment, clicking a link, filling out a form, updating a password, calling a phone number or using a new wi-fi hot spot. A crucial aspect of successful security awareness training is in educating people about how easy it is to be tricked into giving up confidential information.
PHISHING SIMULATION:
- Phishing simulation protects your company from social-engineering threats by training employees to recognise and report them. Phishing emails are also used to spread malware and spyware via links or attachments that can steal data and perform other malicious tasks.
- Phishing simulation training, as part of user security awareness, is one of the cyber security measures being used to help stop attempted phishing incidents.
- A single error by one employee clicking on a single link could result in fraud, a data breach, massive costs, and damage to the company’s reputation.
THE WORKING
To combat phishing, you use phishing simulations to teach your employees how to deal with the threat.
The strongest phishing simulations…
- Are tailored specifically to your organization’s industry and threat level, or highly customizable so that you can edit the email content, attachments and URLs yourself to replicate real threats that your employees have faced in the past.
- As employees become more adept at detecting them, increase the sophistication of the attack.
- Include a “Report Phishing” inbox plugin button that enables users to report both simulated phishing emails and genuine threats to their IT department.
- Include robust admin reporting tools that show you who is falling for the simulated threats so that you can assign further training accordingly.
Simulations should also be ongoing rather than one-time events; phishing attacks are constantly evolving, so continuous testing will provide your employees with the experience to detect even the most sophisticated attacks.
HOW CAN YOU PREVENT PHISHING?
- Educate your employees about phishing. Take advantage of phishing simulation tools to educate and identify phishing risk. Incorporate cyber security awareness campaigns, training, support and education in your corporate culture.
- Use proven security awareness trainingand phishing simulation platforms to keep phishing and social engineering risks top-of-mind for employees. Create internal cyber security heroes who are dedicated to keeping your company safe online.
- Remind your security leaders and cyber security heroes to use phishing simulation tools to regularly monitor employee phishing awareness. Use phishing microlearning modules to educate, train, and influence behaviour.
- Provide ongoing communication and phishing awareness campaigns. Establishing strong password policies and reminding employees about the risks that can come in the form of attachments, emails, and URLs are all part of this.
- Establish network access rules that limit the use of personal devices and the sharing of information outside of your corporate network.
- Ensure that all applications, operating systems, network tools, and internal software are up-to-date and secure. Install malware protection and anti-spam software.
TOP PHISHING SIMULATION SOLUTIONS:
- ESET Cyber Security Awareness Training
- Hook Security PsySec Security Awareness Training
- ProofPoint Security Awareness Training
- Barracuda PhishLine
- Cofense PhishMe
*READ THIS BLOG TO KNOW ABOUT MORE TOP PHISHING SIMULATION SOLUTIONS*
THREE MAIN DMARC POLICIES:
- p=reject refuses to accept email that fails the DMARC check. The non-compliant email is dropped, and the sender receives a bounce-back message detailing the reason for the failure.
- p=quarantine accepts emails that violates the DMARC check, but marks them as spam. This is typically usually done by moving the email in a spam folder, or tagging the subject line with a warning.
- p=none does not impact the flow of email, and is used to monitor which emails are passing or failing the DKIM check. While this policy can help gauge how effective your current policies are, and shape how you implement future email security rules, it does nothing to protect your domain.
RELATED ARTICLES
INFORMING, SIMULATING EXPERIENCE, OR BOTH: A FIELD EXPERIMENT ON PHISHING RISKS
HOW TO PREPARE FOR AN EFFECTIVE PHISHING ATTACK SIMULATION
QUERY
frequently asked questions
- ESET Cyber Security Awareness Training
- Hook Security PsySec Security Awareness Training
- ProofPoint Security Awareness Training
- Barracuda PhishLine
- Cofense PhishMe
Even though they may look like any other web link, phishing links can start a malicious download to hopefully infect your device or transport you to a fake webpage. The latter, which may spoof a bank's website or the login page for a popular service like Netflix, is designed to steal users' login credentials to carry out fraudulent activity. Phishing can be avoided when users understand which warning signs to watch out for and how to avoid falling victim to a hacker's scheme.
- Yes. An organization can conduct a phishing test on multiple domains. However, these domains must be approved. There are several method for obtaining approved to conduct simulated phishing tests for a specific domains. These include but are not limited to email authorization and DNS authorization.
Yes. A phishing simulator includes a template library for various phishing scenarios.
