MailGuard Blog

The persistent rise of cryptocurrency is changing the internet in a variety of ways, and although it’s relatively early days there's already been some high profile cryptocurrency fraud incidents. As soon as a new technology hits the www, scammers move in to grab what they can, and crypto is no different.

The biggest challenge in cybersecurity is keeping up with the new attacks that criminals are always coming up with. They’re always looking for new tools and strategies to defraud companies, so we have to be forward-looking in our approach to defence as well.

MailGuard has built its success on being able to respond to new threats ahead of the market and it’s always been our mission to devise better strategies to combat cyber-attacks in real time.

There’s a widely held misconception that cybercrime only affects big companies but actually, hackers go after smaller operations as well.

Cybercrime is a complex problem. One of the reasons cybersecurity requires a sophisticated, multi-layered approach is that hackers attack in a lot of different ways. A cyber-attack can be as simple as a single fraudulent wire transfer, or as complex as a virus infecting thousands of networked computers.

Last December, cybercriminals stole millions of dollars from several law firms with a simple email scam.

The scammers phoned the lawyers and asked them for legal advice. After a conversation over the phone they promised to email the lawyers some ‘important documents’ related to their cases. When the lawyers opened the emails they found links that pointed to documents stored on an online file sharing site that required them to enter their email account passwords to gain access.

‘The Anxious Optimist in the Corner Office’; that’s the title of PWC’s 21st CEO Survey, which reveals some telling thought trends amongst the world’s business leaders.

Overall, PWC’s report is optimistic about growth but also shows the growing concern that businesspeople have regarding the disruptive economic trends that are being driven by cybersecurity.

In this age of internet-based commerce, all cybercriminals need to do to take control of our company’s finances or steal our data is get us to click on a link. Scammers have come up with some devious tactics to induce their victims into falling for their tricks, and one of the most successful is brandjacking.

If you’re looking for some uplifting reading, I would not recommend The Global Risks Report 2018. Published by The World Economic Forum (WEF), this report is a comprehensive examination of all the things that threaten to derail society. Climate change, tidal waves, water scarcity, terrorism; it’s the ultimate ‘worst-case scenario.’ It makes for sobering reading, but of course, the objective of the WEF Global Risks Report is to help economists and businesspeople mitigate risk.

Cybercrime and data-security are a growing challenge here in Australia. The Australian Government recently published figures estimating that cybercrime costs our economy about AU$1 billion annually and if the international trends are anything to go by, that figure will be growing rapidly over the next few years.

These are interesting times to be in business. The fastest pace of industrial development in history. Huge opportunities. Huge risks. An economic environment that rewards innovation but is also incredibly volatile.

“During the holiday season, it's easy to forget that sometimes the best gift of all is simply the gift of time.” - Kate Klise - author and journalist.

I’ve just come back from a holiday break with my family. It was a welcome opportunity to focus on my loved ones, but it also gave me some time for reflection.

One of the biggest challenges we face dealing with cybersecurity is the way it’s perceived as an IT issue. The reality is that cybercrime exploits gaps in security at every level. Criminals use every means available to them to penetrate a company’s defences: telephone calls; fake documents; and identity theft.

There’s a striking cybercrime case in the headlines this week involving email fraud.

John Kahlbetzer - one of the richest people in Australia according to Forbes - lost AU$1 million in a scam that was as simple as it was effective.

The shocking news about Uber’s data breach woes just keeps on coming. After reading Stephen Little’s Independent article ‘Uber data leak hit 2.7m UK customers’ I felt compelled to break my silence on this issue.

I don’t like to heap criticism on an already embattled company, but the latest revelations about Uber’s unethical behaviour has made them fair game for critique, I think. Uber’s handling of their ongoing cybercrime crisis has landed them in a situation where they are now dealing with a legal battle and a public relations meltdown as well.

I’ve received a number of messages on LinkedIn over the last 24 hours that rang alarm bells. At first glance they looked like ordinary notes from my contacts, but then I noticed they were all asking me to click on an unfamiliar link

An Interview with Prof. Gary Martin of AIM WA

I recently spoke at a leadership forum organised by the Australian Institute of Management, Western Australia (AIM WA). In my talk, I invited the audience to consider the real and immediate threat that cybercrime poses to business, not only in terms of potential losses but at the level where it can be a threat to a company’s very existence.

Following-up on the AIM WA forum I interviewed Professor Gary Martin. Gary is CEO and Executive Director of AIM WA, and is hands-on in making their forums happen.