MailGuard Blog

The holidays are fast approaching, and with retailers and consumers getting ready for the biggest sales of the year on Black Friday (the 26th of November), cybercriminals, who have been perfecting their social engineering techniques, are also gearing up to wreak havoc.  

We would like to thank the ACCC for providing us with this valuable interview with ACCC Deputy Chair, Delia Rickard, discussing tips on how to have a conversation about scams with our networks. While her comments are primarily geared towards consumers and individuals, it’s important to note that businesses and their employees can be vulnerable too.

We would like to thank the National Cyber Security Alliance for providing the following valuable information to help protect from phishing threats. 

Think twice before you click on this nasty voicemail attachment landing in inboxes this week. With an innocent “Left you a message” subject line, prefaced by a local telephone number and stamped with the date, the email is marked as ‘High Priority' and ‘Sent via Microsoft Voice’. The email is targeting a business in the United States and comes from a compromised account belonging to a legitimate printing company (mountain-media(dot)com) in Colorado.

There has been a 2500% increase in the sale of cybercrime kits on the dark-web since 2016, said Angus Taylor MP, Australian Minister for Law Enforcement and Cyber Security in a recent interview.
Taylor expressed his concern about this surge in online criminal activity. He noted that there has been “a high take-up of digital technologies” by Australian companies, but about 30% of smaller companies have inadequate cybersecurity measures in place. 

• Phishing
• Brandjacking
• CEO fraud

All these kinds of cybercrime are perpetrated using email as their primary vector.

Every business is constantly sending and receiving emails, it’s part of the background noise of everyday work, so it’s a powerful tool for criminals who want to slip under the wire and attack a company from the inside out.

You have your solicitor look over contracts before they’re signed.
Your accountant examines your books to find any irregularities.
There are checks and balances in place to monitor purchases, invoicing, payroll and transactions of every kind.
You’re confident that your company’s financial integrity is well protected, but what about the online realm?

 Spear-phishing and ransomware are the most common cyber techniques used to exploit Australians, a new cybercrime threat report has revealed.

Every day, cyber criminals are dreaming up new get-rich-quick schemes. Whether impersonating a popular brand on Facebook, offering bulk followers on Instagram, or trying to deceive a well-meaning accounts worker, it’s hard to escape opportunistic scammers.

The attacks can take many names, from CEO Fraud, to Whaling and Business Email Compromise. Whichever name you choose, spear phishing attacks impersonating influential executives continue to be a big problem for businesses of all sizes.

Organisations have again been the target of a number of spear phishing attacks this week, which MailGuard has successfully blocked.