Cyberattack: 3 Industries Hit

Transportation, Legal and Finance Sectors Hit the Hardest by Cyberattacks

Generally, there are four main categories of attack types:

• Spam

• Impersonation

• Opportunistic

• Targeted

Recent statistics highlight impersonation attacks are on this rise, accounting for 25% of total detections, which now include more advanced voice phishing or ‘vishing’ where hackers use social engineering to gain access to personal and financial information via a victim’s telephone system.

There have been complex, targeted campaigns leveraging a number of vectors that can occur over several days. These sophisticated attacks are likely carried out by organised and determined threat actors (hackers), employing obfuscation, layering, exploits, and encryption to evade detection.

Additionally, recent statistics report three industries targeted the most by cyberattacks: banking, legal and transport.

Finance and Legal industries are rich with sensitive information that yield results for threat actors while transportation is most vulnerable to state-sponsored threat actors seeking to disrupt the logistical and supply chain capability of rivals.

Threat actors will attempt a multitude of methods to infiltrate an organisation, from using sophisticated tactics such as voice phishing and domain spoofing, to simple spam. Research found the majority of threats were simple, sheer volume attacks. Easy to execute, but not as easy to protect against due to the role human error plays in an organisation’s vulnerability.

Business needs a proactive and pervasive approach to email security using the best tools that allow for monitoring from both in and outside the perimeter. This approach requires educating the last line of defense – employees.

Combining technology with a well-educated workforce will help organisations strengthen security against both simple and sophisticated threats.

Contact Cyberlorian to find out how you can minimise business risk by improving cybersecurity.

Raph Tripp has worked in a variety of roles including IT management, Operations, project management, PMO and as both systems and business analyst. Since 2000 he has worked in a range of industries including gaming, hospitality, managed services, NFP and education.