Posted by: Praveen Joshi
December 16, 2022
Phishing is a malicious practice of tricking people into giving their critical information like authentication details and personal data. Hackers do it by sending fraudulent communications that appear to come from a reputable source. The most common medium for phishing attacks is email. The primary purpose of phishing attacks is to steal pertinent information like credit card details, login credentials, and other crucial financial information. Attackers also use phishing techniques to install malware into the victim’s systems. People often fall into the trap of such attacks because the emails come with trustworthy brandings, and they are too hard to ignore.
of phishing attacks involved credential phishing, stealing usernames and passwords specifically.
of attack groups use spear phishing as the primary infection vector.
of phishing attacks are motivated by the purpose of intelligence gathering.
of people working in the IT industry cannot identify a phishing scam.
The first step would be to fortify your security to its full potential. There are various kinds of cybersecurity procedures for that. It includes thorough assessments of your infrastructure and methods like API Penetration Testing. Additionally, you can adopt some extra things into your routine as well. The following are the best practices to adopt for the prevention of phishing attacks over your infrastructure.
To keep safe from phishing attacks, first, you need to know what a phishing attack is. Therefore, try to learn as much as you can about phishing, how it initiates, how it propagates, and what kind of damage it can impart. Cyber Security Consultation with an expert on the matter will help a lot on this. Also, attack methods are continuously being evolved and developed. So, you need to be updated with what is going on right now and be prepared accordingly.
Phishing campaigns are usually propagated through emails or instant messages containing malicious links. So, never click on a link blindly. Even if the message or the email is from a known sender. Sometimes the email comes masked with the identity of a big brand or a trustworthy name. This might trick you into clicking the link without having a second thought. One thing you can do is first hover on the link and see if it directs you to a legitimate or trustworthy page or site.
There are a lot of tools, plugins, and add-ons you can add to your browser or applications. These tools and plugins are designed to alert you about malicious websites and known phishing websites. Although this does not make you 100% safe. But these tools are available basically for free and can warn you about a lot of potential phishing campaigns. So, it’s good to have them installed into every system of your organization.
It is important to verify a site’s security and authenticity before you fill out any form on it or reveal any critical information about yourself. If a website doesn’t start with “https”, or you do not see a closed padlock icon next to the URL, refrain from entering any information or downloading any files from that site. Websites that are running without security certificates, might potentially be the hub for phishing activities. So, it is better to maintain a digital distance from such websites.
No matter how many security protocols you have. Security Audits, API Penetration Testing, and Vulnerability Assessments are all there to do their job. But there is always an outside chance of losing your credentials. So, it is recommended by experts that you must use different passwords for different online accounts and rotate them at regular intervals.
Frequent update notifications might be annoying. But they are the actual lifesavers. Each update comes with a security patch fixing a known vulnerability in the previous version. Hence, it is important to download and install each security update for every aspect of your digital infrastructure.
Firewall work as a protective shield against attacks coming from outside of your network perimeter. Using both network and desktop firewalls can boost your security levels and make you significantly immune to various attack vectors.
