Social engineering attacks are growing rapidly in numbers and sophistication. Data suggests that 98% of cyberattacks rely on social engineering! A 40% year-on-year increase was seen in ransomware attacks that were socially engineered! 43% of IT professionals said that they had been at the receiving end of social engineering schemes in the last year! What are social engineering cyberattacks? Why should you be concerned?
Read on to learn more about social engineering attacks and ways to prevent them.
Social engineering is a broad term used to refer to malicious activities that exploit human errors/ emotions/ weaknesses/ lack of knowledge to manipulate unsuspecting victims to take unsafe actions. These attacks rely on actual interaction between attackers and victims. The attackers coax victims into compromising themselves rather than relying on brute force methods.
Social engineering attacks, at their core, are not cyberattacks; they are acts of psychological manipulation aimed at gaining the trust of targets, getting them to lower their guard and persuading them into making security errors such as giving away sensitive information, downloading malware, clicking on unsafe links and so on.
The common types of social engineering attacks:
What makes social engineering attacks particularly dangerous is that not everyone needs to be targeted. Just one successfully manipulated user could divulge enough information to trigger massive attacks and severe damage to the organization.
Relying on the element of human error, these attacks lure unsuspecting victims into downloading malware, sharing credentials, transferring money, clicking on fraudulent ads/ spam links, purchasing products, etc. Successful social engineering attacks could lead to identity theft, malware attacks, ransomware attacks, reputational damage, data theft, service disruption and unauthorized access, among others.
This attack lifecycle could be as short as a phone call/ a single email interaction or take place over months on social media chats. They may or may not involve face-to-face or voice interactions.
Regardless of the type of social engineering attack, all contain four key traits:
Given that humans are the weak links in security, one of the best ways to prevent social engineering attacks is providing continuous education to users, employees including high-level executives and privileged administrators, and other key stakeholders.
Some other tips for social engineering attack prevention are:
The Bottomline
Over the years, social engineering cyberattacks have grown in sophistication to such an extent that fake websites and emails look realistic enough to fool targets. Organizations must take a proactive approach to prevent social engineering attacks.
This post was last modified on February 14, 2024 21:34
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