Explore a cybersecurity guide to tackling the growing threat of enhanced phishing attacks, with strategies to safeguard your organization’s cybersecurity in 2024.
Table of content
Introduction
1. Understanding the Next-Generation Phishing Attacks
1.1. Vishing and Smishing
1.2. Email Phishing
1.3. Deepfake Scams
1.4. Social Media Phishing
2. Strategies to Prevent Advanced-Level Phishing Attacks
2.1. Security Awareness Training and Organizational Policies
2.2. Anti-phishing Tools and Technology
Final Thoughts
Introduction
As cyberattacks are becoming more sophisticated, phishing continues to dominate as one of the most prevalent and damaging methods used by cybercriminals. While traditional phishing attacks typically relied on poorly constructed email, modern-day phishing campaigns have evolved to take advantage of new technologies, such as AI, ML, and deepfakes. According to Cisco, these attacks have increased by 58%, and 90% of them involve data breaches, with 42% linked to malware and ransomware.
For CISOs, and IT and security teams, the rise of enhanced phishing poses a great threat that requires not only advanced software but also heightened security awareness and strategic planning that will guard the organization’s data and infrastructure.
Therefore, to protect your company from an avoidable phishing attempt, AITech Park brings you a comprehensive guide on the different types of phishing attacks, and how you can tackle them.
1. Understanding the Next-Generation Phishing Attacks
The traditional phishing attacks were quite different from what CISOs and IT teams are currently dealing with.
Earlier phishing attacks could easily be identified with misspellings or poorly worded messages; while we might consider these tactics to be quite sloppy, cyber attackers were well aware of their target, but people who fell into that trap were not aware and would often click on links.
However, with a mix of generative AI, cybercriminals can now ingest more data by using different tones and words and targeting CEOs and other senior leaders of various enterprises and organizations that use massive datasets every day.
For a better understanding, let’s dive into the different types of new-age phishing attacks:
1.1. Vishing and Smishing
AI-based phishing attacks are quite common in today’s digital landscape. Vishing is a voiced-based campaign (phone calls), and smishing is a text-based attack. AI has changed the way vishing attacks are launched, as now they can launch a live interaction by calling the victim using a deep fake. Attackers use the voice of someone that the victim knows and then extract money or personal data from them. Similarly, instead of calling scammers, smishing (SMS text messages with links and attachments) is used to gain users’ information.
1.2. Email Phishing
Email phishing is the oldest and most common form of phishing, where scammers send spam emails to as many people as possible, hoping that a fraction of the targets fall for the attack. As per a recent study by Deloitte, it was witnessed that 91% of cyberattacks begin with email phishing and 32% of successful breaches involve the use of phishing techniques.
Cyberattackers often impersonate any well-known or legitimate brands and target their victims through those brands.
How to Spot Spam Emails?
Scammers often write email subject lines that are more appealing with strong emotions or create a sense of urgency. The body of the email instructs the recipient to take reasonable actions that deal with sensitive information or downloading malware. For instance, a phishing link might read, “Click here to update your profile.” When the victim clicks that malicious link, it takes them to a fake website that embezzles their login credentials.
1.3. Deepfake Scams
With rapid development in AI technology, deepfake has become more accessible to users. In recent research by Egress, 63% of cybersecurity personnel surveyed were worried about the cyber attacks introduced by deepfakes. To battle these types of attacks, security analysts can use deepfake detection tools such as Sentinel, Intel’s Real-Time Deepfake Detector, or Microsoft’s Video Authenticator Tool that point out synthetic images generated by AI and ML technologies, leaving unique traces that are invisible to the human eye.
For instance, in recent years there have been modified videos of popular dignitaries that are common on social media platforms; these videos can be with a fun intention or sometimes defaming them through manipulated speeches or actions.
1.4. Social Media Phishing
In the 21st century, social media phishing is the most common cyberattack. Cybercriminals often use victims’ personal information, which is easily accessible on social media platforms, namely Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter); further, they send links or attachments and sometimes call them to steal sensitive data or money. However, users can easily eliminate the issues of social media phishing by simply not accepting any friend request from unknown individuals or from spam accounts that have little to no recent activities. Users must avoid clicking on any links that they receive via messages.
2. Strategies to Prevent Advanced-Level Phishing Attacks
Cyberattackers are often well-funded, exceptionally skilled, and quite persistent at reconnaissance. Therefore, they can easily find these security gaps in an organization and further exploit these vulnerabilities to inject malicious codes. However, CISOs and IT and security teams can prevent advanced levels of phishing through various strategies, tools, and techniques.
2.1. Security Awareness Training and Organizational Policies
Firstly, ensure a zero-trust framework that will enhance your initial step of security. This approach requires ongoing verification of all users and devices, stringent access controls, and robust identity management. This approach requires authorized users to access sensitive information and reduces the risk of network abuse.
With advanced-level security analytics with ML and AI, security engineers can detect anomalies and predict potential threats. This assertive approach authorizes quicker response times and more adequate mitigation strategies.
A well-tested incident response plan is quite vital to minimize the impact of network abuse. IT security managers should ensure that the incident response plans are quite comprehensive and cover all potential scenarios and details of specific actions at each stage of any incident. This also implies that CISOs must collaborate with industry peers, regulatory bodies, and security organizations to stay relevant to the latest trends and best practices.
For a better understanding of how to safeguard the organizations, CISOs can actively participate in industry forums, workshops, and cybersecurity conferences.
2.2. Anti-phishing Tools and Technology
Apart from employee training and company policies, security teams can implement different tools and technologies to detect phishing messages and prevent hackers who use phishing to break into networks.
For starters, security architects can implement robust spam filters and email security software, namely, Coro Cybersecurity, Proofpoint Email Security, and Protection and Mimecast Email Security, that will recognize phishing emails and other spam messages and move the scams and spam into different folders, helping you to eradicate malicious links and code.
Paid antivirus and antimalware software (Norton 360, McAfee+, and Bitdefender) are best to detect and neutralize malicious files or code carried by phishing emails. Multifactor authentication (MFA) can be one of the best solutions to prevent hackers from taking over your account. MFA’s second factor, i.e., a fingerprint scan or a one-time passcode, will make it hard for hackers to steal your data.
For more security, the threat intelligence team can also implement different endpoint security tools such as Cisco Secure Endpoint, Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, Sophos Intercept X, and ESET Enterprise Inspector. These tools use AI and advanced analytics to block phishing attempts and malware and save you time and money in the long run.
Lastly, next-generation firewalls (NGFWs), provide enhanced security features compared to traditional firewalls. By deploying NGFWs, IT and security teams can add an extra level to defend against sophisticated network abuse techniques.
Final Thoughts
In the ever-evolving technological landscape, the stakes of falling into phishing scams are quite high. Therefore, to create a safe environment for every industry, CISOs, and IT and security teams must adopt a multifaceted approach that will not only combat network abuse but also aid in fostering a culture of security awareness.
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