Phishing remains the number one cyber threat to businesses and there are no signs that cybercriminals will be abandoning phishing any time soon. Phishing is defined as the use of deception to fraudulently obtain sensitive information, which often involves impersonating trusted individuals and using social engineering techniques to trick people into disclosing their login credentials.
It is not necessary to be a hacker to conduct phishing campaigns. All that is needed is a modicum of technical expertise and the ability to send emails. The actual phishing kits that are loaded onto websites to harvest credentials do not need to be created from scratch, as they can simply be purchased on hacking forums and dark net websites. A potential phisher only needs to pay for the kit, which typically costs between $20 and $1,000, then host it on a website, and send emails, SMS messages, or instant messages to direct users to the website.
The ease of obtaining a phishing kit makes this this method of attacking businesses simple. All that is needed is a plausible lure, and many people will disclose their credentials. Figures released by security awareness training companies show just how frequently employees fall for these scams. Around 30% of phishing emails are opened by recipients, and 12% of those individuals either open attachments or click hyperlinks in emails.
One 2020 study, conducted on 191 employees of an Italian company, showed no significant difference between employees’ demographics and susceptibility to phishing. Anyone can fall for a phishing scam. Interestingly, that study, published by the Association for Computing Machinery, also found that while the employees believed their security awareness training had been effective, it did not appear to have any effect on their susceptibility to phishing attacks.
Phishing is popular with cybercriminals, it is one of the easiest scams to perform, and it is often successful and profitable. Security awareness training will help to prepare employees and, if performed properly, regularly, and with subsequent phishing simulations to reinforce the training, can help to reduce susceptibility, but what is most important is to ensure that phishing emails do not land in inboxes where they can be opened by employees.
To block the phishing emails at source you need an advanced email security solution. Many email security solutions are heavily reliant on blacklists of IP addresses and domains that have previously been used for phishing and other malicious activities. Along with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC to identify email impersonation attacks, it is possible to identify and block around 99% of phishing emails.
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However, to block the remaining 1% without also miscategorizing genuine emails as potentially malicious requires more advanced techniques. SpamTitan achieves independently verified catch rate of 99.97%, which is due to standard anti-phishing measures coupled with greylisting and machine learning techniques.
Greylisting is the process of initially rejecting a message and requesting it be resent. Since phishers’ mail servers are usually too busy on spam runs, the delay in the message being resent is a red flag. Along with other indicators, this helps SpamTitan catch more spam and phishing emails. Machine learning techniques are used to identify the typical emails that a company receives, which allows deviations from the norm to be identified which raises a further red flag.
In addition to a high detection rate and low false positive rate, SpamTitan is easy to implement and use, and regularly receives top marks in user reviews. SpamTitan has achieved 5 out of 5 on Expert Insights, is the most reviewed and best reviewed email security solution on G2, and is also a top-rated solution on Capterra, GetApp, and Software Advice.
SpamTitan works seamlessly with Office 365 and greatly improves phishing email detection, is priced to make it affordable for small- and medium-sized businesses, and has a much-loved managed service provider offering, allowing MSPs to incorporate highly effective spam and phishing protection into their service stacks.
If you want to improve your defenses against phishing attacks, why not give SpamTitan a try. You can trial the solution for two weeks free of charge, during which time you will be able to try the full product and will have access to full product support, should you need it.
Give the TitanHQ team a call today to find out more!