While the COVID-19 outbreak has disrupted the lives and operations of many people and organizations, the pandemic failed to interrupt the onslaught of spam and phishing emails targeting people’s inboxes. That’s according to an attack landscape update published today by cybersecurity provider F-Secure.
Read More: Showpad Announces TRANSFORM 2020, Virtual Conference For Elevating Enablement
According to F-Secure’s Attack Landscape H1 2020 report, which examines developments with online threats during the first half of the year, cyber criminals moved quickly to capitalize on the COVID-19 outbreak. Beginning in March and continuing through most of the spring, there was a significant increase of malicious emails utilizing various COVID-19 issues as a lure to manipulate users into exposing themselves to various email attacks and scams.
COVID-19-related campaigns included in these emails ranged from attempts to trick users into ordering face masks from phony websites, to infecting them with malware via malicious attachments. Three-quarters of attachments in these emails contained infostealers – a type of malware that steals sensitive information (such as passwords or other credentials) from an infected system.
Read More: AdLedger Announces CryptoRTB Protocol For Digital Advertising
“Cyber criminals don’t have many operational constraints, so they can quickly respond to breaking events and incorporate them into their campaigns. The earliest days of the COVID-19 outbreak left a lot of people confused or worried, and attackers predictably tried to prey on their anxieties,” said Calvin Gan, a manager with F-Secure’s Tactical Defense Unit. “Spotting malicious emails isn’t typically a priority for busy employees, which is why attackers frequently attempt to trick them into compromising organizations.”
Read More: Moz To Update Proprietary Page Authority Metric To Better Predict Ranking Ability