As we interact more and more with electronic equipment, phishing scams are on the rise. Cyber criminals do not discriminate, but they have preferred victims, such as parents or grandparentsThe health and non-physical money industries are among the favorites of these charactersWhat do professionals think about the future of phishing and ransomware?
As we already know, identity theft is one of the most common fraud maneuvers that exist. Phishing scams are the order of the day, but they are updated as time goes by, so it is convenient to review the 2022 trendsto know the latest movements of cybercriminals, and thus be able to anticipate them, avoiding falling into the traps they may set.
The fact is that, if until a few years ago important people had to be extremely careful about their online security, today practically we all face the same dangers, and we must be aware of how a hacker operates, so that they cannot surprise us and our information remains safe.
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So what is phishing?
Very briefly, the definition of phishing speaks of a fraudulent practice that consists of contacting people by email, phone or SMS, pretending to be a third party, requesting personal data, for example your passwords or credit card codes, to get money, extort money by disclosing them, etc..
Currently we can distinguish different types of phishing, although the most common are those related to identity theft by email. Other common ones are whale whaling or phishing, and we cannot fail to mention the latest trend: cryptocurrency investment scams, including Bitcoin.
Tools like a Secure Email Gateway monitor the emails we receive
Beware of scammers
If we go to the statistics, we find that account hijacking ransomware scams produced losses of about 590 million dollars in the first half of 2021; or what the crypto fraud we were talking about recorded $80 million in profile thefts between October 2020 and March 2021.
How to prevent phishing attacks
To prevent fraudsters from accessing our passwords, and therefore information and money, there are measures that we must adopt in the short term, and that complement the online security resource training.
We discuss tools like a Secure Email Gateway that monitors the emails we receive. Also a Cloud Email Security, an instrument that has been specifically designed to prevent phishing.
Beyond these two assumptions, it is clear that the installation of security technologies as filters is one of the most concrete solutions we have in this area, for which individuals and companies, almost equally, are forced to evaluate the incorporation of devices that offer somewhat more reliable workstations.
Phishing predictions for 2022 and 2023
The different studies on the matter allow us to anticipate some of the specific threats that appear as those that we will have to be aware of, and predictions for this year are not optimistic.
Without going any further, the consulting firm Osterman Research indicates that only 16% of organizations closed 2021 without any phishing or ransomware attack attempts, which helps us understand how frequent the attacks are.
The good news is that institutions and companies seem to be aware of the riskbecause 7 out of 10 they are prepared to repel these external attacks, pretending to keep up as long as possible.
The elderly represent the perfect victim for hackers, as they are the most vulnerable
The most affected industries
Healthcare: Retrieving a hijacked medical record can cost more than $400 Manufacturing: Malware maintains a top position among cybercriminals Finance: Local files, SQL attacks, and scripting attacks put you in check
Who is being attacked, according to the figures?
Scammers do not discriminate. They are not interested in the race, income or location of their potential victims. However, this does not mean that they have the same success rate with any victim, and that is the most important thing.
While it is estimated that between two and three million people are victims of phishing each year, the elderly represent the perfect victim for hackers, as they are the most vulnerable to these scams.
In fact, it is no coincidence that this loneliness, this boredom, leads older people to believe that someone they know is contacting them. Unfortunately, that reality can cause them to make a mistake.
On the other hand, fraudsters are aware that older people, due to this partially justified prejudice about their abilities with the latest technologies, are less likely to report a scam.
Kinds of scams in which parents and grandparents fall
The most recurrent malicious attacks against 65-year-olds or more are associated with winning raffles, receiving drug prescriptions, or a site to meet people, without completely ruling out job offers.
The future of phishing
If in 2021 an organization suffered from ransomware every 11 seconds, by a decade from now, these attacks will have a volume of 265,000 million dollars each year. They will suffer, then, every two seconds.
That said, and hoping not to be too pessimistic, phishing will be around for several years.because it is here to stay. However, if you have a group of trained people, and the necessary devices, you can be confident that the impact of the attacks will not be too great, and you will be able to overcome it.
At the moment, for individuals it remains to entrust themselves to virtual private networks and other effective solutions, which require a minimum investment. Ditto for two-factor authentication (2FA) as long as it can be used.
What else would you like to know about cyber scams and phishing?
