During that time, the first phishers created an algorithm to generate random credit card numbers in order to get an original card’s match from the AOL accounts.
They chose a mode of phishing that was less expensive and easy to create and track: email phishing.
Phishers started purchasing domains which sounded similar to well-known domains like yahoo-info.com and manager-apple.com.
Previously, phishing was done through two major means: email phishing and domain spoofing.
Out of the different types of phishing attacks, Spear phishing is the most commonly used type of phishing attack – on individual users as well as organizations.
Here are a couple of basic steps you should take to stop major types of phishing attacks:
To know more about preventing different types of phishing attacks, read our in-depth article on How to Prevent a Phishing Attack?
cording to the APWG report, the number of unique phishing websites had reached 73.80% from October 2017 to March 2018.
And, 48.60% of the reported phishing incidents had used “.COM” domains.
How to prevent email phishing? The best way to prevent these attacks is by carefully reading the sender’s email address. If you are not sure about the characters in an email address, then copy and paste it in the notepad to check the use of numeric or special characters. You can also configure security settings on Gmail and Outlook.
Here is a brand impersonation example targeting Citibank customers.
How to prevent mass phishing attacks? Check whether you are marked in the “To” section or “cc” section of the received mail. Avoid replying to an email marked to you with an unknown set of people.
In the example below, you can see that there’s a typo in the link that people can easily miss: “www.citiibank.com…” instead of “www.citibank.com…”
In the example, you might think that the offer looks genuine, but when you click on the link, instead of ‘amazon.com,’ you will be redirected to ‘arnazon.com’ – which belongs to the attacker.
How to prevent URL phishing?
Hover the cursor over the attached link. The full link will appear on the laptop screen. If the link is different or seems phishy, don’t click on it! In case of mobile devices, press and hold over the link, and the attached link will appear as a pop-up window with actionable options.
What is a subdomain attack?
Assume that you receive an email from your organization www.organizationname.com or from a colleague’s email id colleaguename@gmail.com.
The email instructs you to click on the given link www.organizationname.support.com and log in for accessing data in order to produce an urgent report.
You can see the sender’s domain is “linkedin.example.com” – which means that subdomain is linkedin under the example domain.
Why is a subdomain attack so difficult to spot?
How to prevent a subdomain phishing attack?
Before clicking on any attached link from an unknown sender, read the domain name carefully. And remember, it is always read from right to left.
How to prevent in-session phishing?
In the example below, the ad says “Full Version & 100% Free!”
A similar example is given below, where the search results for “blockchain” shows a fake web page as the top search result – paid by the scammers for making it appear as the first result.
This example doesn’t state any offer, but it targets the trust of a user by claiming itself to be the “official site.”
How to prevent SEO phishing? The best way to avoid search engine attacks is to avoid the ads displayed in the paid results section – look for the “ad” tag displayed next to the website link, which is usually found on the top-most results. Also, if you know the URL, then try to type it whenever possible.
How is website spoofing done?
How to prevent Website Impersonation attacks? Third-party tools like SysCloud’s Phishing Protection provide the best possible security from all kinds of spoofing attacks. As a part of their service, all the suspicious websites are not only blocked but also reported to the user.
Hackers infect the script of a legitimate website – which you visit regularly, identified through social engineering – with a script that will redirect you to a phishing page.
How to prevent cross-site scripting attacks?
Use browsers with an in-built XSS protection feature
In Man-in-the-Middle– MITM, MitM, MiM, or MIM – attack, a malicious actor intercepts online interaction between two parties.
1. ARP spoofing: ARP spoofing is an attack in which a malicious actor sends a fake ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) message over a local area network. This links the attacker’s MAC (Machine address) address to the IP address of a legitimate computer or server on the network.
2. DNS spoofing: Domain Name System (DNS) spoofing or DNS Cache Poisoning is a form of hacking that corrupts the DNS data in the resolver cache, causing the name server to return incorrect result records.
How to prevent MiTM phishing attacks?The only way to prevent the Man-in-the-Middle attack is by encrypting your online data. Using S/MIME encryption can help you to secure the data from misuse by cybercrooks, or you can use Third-party tools to encrypt your data.
Clone phishing attack is harmful for one major reason: The victim will never suspect the email.
How to prevent clone phishing?
1. Linking an image directly to the URL and sending it to the victim as a mass email attack.
2. Using an encoded image (.jpeg) or other media files like song (.mp3), video (.mp4), or GIF files (.gif). In this type of attack, the hacker embeds a batch file (.bat) or virus into an image and sends it as an attachment to a victim.
Kaspersky Lab published a report on PNG (Portable Network Graphics) phishing, as shown in the image below.
A scam reported by BBC in which Emma Watson – a businesswoman – was duped in the name of a (fraud) bank alert.
How to prevent voice phishing attacks? The security and prevention from these attacks rely completely on the victim. If s/he is aware of such attacks – and knows whether to act on such calls or not – s/he will be able to prevent it.
On April 4, 2016, the FBI issued a warning against these CEO frauds stating that “There is a 270 percent increase in the identified victims and exposed loss.” The total loss was around $2.3 billion and the average loss was around $50,000 which itself is a boatload of money.
How to prevent CEO Fraud? The only way to avoid such scams is to check the sender details – confirming the identity through human efforts – or by enabling a third-party solution for anti-phishing protection in your organization.
1. Hijacking a user’s computer or an online session,
2. Stealing a user’s confidential data,
3. Conducting fraudulent activities, and
4. Launching a DDoS attack.
Mostly, viruses are attached with .exe files to infect your computer or laptop.
WannaCry was crypto-worm ransomware that affected more than 200,000 computers across 150 countries by encrypting and locking the data at the user’s end. The estimated loss by this attack was $4 billion USD.
To learn how to protect your Gmail against ransomware, click here
System spy: Hijack any of the Web searches, homepages, and other Internet Explorer settings. (E.g.) CoolWebSearch (CWS)
Adware: Display advertisements based on your Web surfing history. (E.g.) Gator (GAIN)
Keystocks: Monitor keystrokes – passwords and details – and take screenshots. (E.g.) Advanced Keylogger
How to prevent malware phishing? Using an updated anti-malware and antivirus is the best available option. Also, an up-to-date browser works as an extra security layer from these types of phishing attacks.
Now that you know the types of phishing, check out how to prevent them.
To learn about the latest phishing scams and safety precautions, stay in touch with us.