Assessing Today’s Cyber-Threats and Determining How to Thwart Them

On the surface, it feels like a mundane interaction. You receive an email with an attachment, which can only be opened by entering your Office 365 login credentials, purportedly to “verify your account.” You provide the information, but the attachment is blank. Nothing happens. It was just a mysterious glitch or technical misunderstanding, right?

Wrong. You were the victim of phishing — the fraudulent practice of sending emails purporting to be from reputable companies to induce individuals to reveal personal information (passwords, credit card numbers, and bank account details.) Today, phishing is arguably the greatest threat in an increasingly sophisticated cyber-security environment.

Phishing vs. Spear Phishing 

Phishing scammers cast a wide net in the ocean, so to speak, attempting to lure any users they can reach. But another form of phishing, spear phishing, is highly targeted. Spear phishing scammers go after so-called sharks — CEOs, finance directors, and others with decision-making power. The scammers do their homework on these targets and their companies, and craft emails that are specifically designed to lure the executives to disclose personal information.

For phishers, the gold standard is obtaining a user’s Office 365 credentials, because that enables access to the victim’s email, documents, SharePoint team sites, and more.

Ransomware

Another common threat is ransomware — malware that encrypts files on a device, blocking the user’s files. The perpetrators subsequently demand a ransom for decryption and renewed access to the victim’s information.

Since ransomware isn’t easily reversible, without a sound data backup strategy in place, the user will be hard-pressed to retrieve the information without paying the ransom. And over time, the encryption keys deployed in ransomware attacks have become more complex and more challenging to crack.

How Do Today’s Viruses Operate? 

Whether they’re involved in phishing, ransomware, or other malicious activity, today’s viruses hibernate — meaning that they stick around quietly, behind the scenes, in places where users wouldn’t usually look for them. The viruses do everything they can to fly under the radar and remain in the system for as long as possible.

Modern viruses are no longer content with simply disrupting software. Their end goal is obtaining users’ personal information, which is the pathway to identity theft, credit card fraud, demanding a ransom, and other forms of financial gain for the scammers.

What Can I Do About It?

Education is the first step to protecting users against these cyber-threats. Most importantly, users need to know what they should be looking for. At BARR Credit Services, we always discussing cyber-security issues during our monthly company-wide meetings. This topic is particularly timely amid the ongoing war in Ukraine, as Russia is known for incorporating cyber-attacks into its broader wartime strategy, and viruses originating in that region aren’t likely to remain confined to those countries’ borders.

Constant vigilance is crucial. Have your “Spidey-Sense” up at all times.  STOP if you click on a webpage or email asking for your login credentials. That’s a clear sign of suspicious activity. Whenever you’re in communication with someone who seems to be misrepresenting themself, you can start by blocking them. When an email looks even the slightest bit off-color, BARR users can utilize a feature called IDR (inbox detection and response), which allows them to report the message to our information technology staff.

BARR also uses an ePrism for email security. This mechanism sits between the internet and our email provider, using artificial intelligence and heuristics to intercept content and determine if it’s malicious before it ever reaches our email server.

Cyber insurance is also increasingly common, especially in collections and the broader financial services industry. BARR has carried cyber insurance for many years. At the same time, as threats have risen, so has the cost of cyber insurance.

Finally, by using Microsoft products, our end-user devices (computers and mobile phones) receive endpoint protection — cloud-based security systems safeguard them from threats before an email arrives in anyone’s inbox.

What Happens When These Measures Fail?

If you’ve fallen prey to the initial layer of a scam and you’ve surrendered some personal information, you’re not necessarily stuck on the path to financial loss. You can always stop providing information once the interaction feels abnormal and promptly report the suspicious activity. Nobody on an IT staff will ever be upset that you made that call.