the average cost of a breach is $3.86 million. The board is made up of mainly commercial, financial and legal executives so I find that the best way to express my ideas is through analogies. business email compromise (BEC) attacks, to scoop up credentials, or worse, compromise critical systems. Perhaps the most notable whaling phishing attack occurred in 2016 when a high-ranking Snapchat employee received an email from a fraudster impersonating the company’s CEO. Whaling is such a worst and dangerous attack that attackers attacked the account of the CEO of Snapchat. In 2016, a Snapchat employee fell for a whaling attack and revealed colleagues’ payroll information. Not only that, but Varonis said that whaling went up 200% in 2017 alone, showing that hackers are warming to the idea of going big phishing. And what can be done to stop them? 1. Put measures in place to protect your people, especially when security is the last thing on their mind. Examples of a whaling attack. Even the most vigilant employees can be foxed by a spear phishing scam if it is sent on a busy day, delivered in a particular tone, or perceived to be from an authoritative source. CEO fraud is a type of spear phishing attack where attackers impersonate a CEO, CFO or another high-level executive. I pay most attention to human resources because keeping talent is a factor that almost every other IT goal depends on. A lack of employee education when it comes to cybersecurity risks is a very big threat. Examples of whaling attack. But spear phishing can take many forms. 100 Million Google and Facebook Spear Phishing Scam. What needs to change about how most organizations are handling their IT? A whaling attack is a targeted attempt to steal sensitive information from a company such as financial information or personal details about employees. In a stress-inducing attempt at getting their hands on some free money, the attacker sends an ‘urgent’ email. Some of the most impersonated parties around the world are not necessarily businesses at all but institutions. Conveniently for attackers, account takeover is often achieved after a successful spear phishing attack. What is Typosquatting (and how to prevent it). Armed with access, the attackers launched further attacks…against those companies.…The message sent seemed legitimate enough…to cause people to take action.…Snapchat was the victim of a whaling attack.…In early 2016, the social media app Snapchat fell victim…to a whaling attack when a high-ranking employee was emailed…by a cybercriminal impersonating the CEO…was fooled into revealing … Our security ratings engine monitors millions of companies every day. The relationship between phishing, spear phishing and whaling. CEO fraud Once this is done, before executing the attack itself, the attackers must first impersonate an employee or one of the company’s external counterparties. Slowly, the bank has started to change and become much more flexible and efficient. Examples of Whaling Attacks. To identify and prevent inbound email threats, like whaling, SEGs commonly rely on the following—. Whaling attacks are designed to trick people into doing something like sending a wire transfer or clicking on a malicious link. Every business has a finite number of employees, which makes it easier for security products to keep on top of potentially suspicious activity on “employee” email accounts. Originally hired to restructure the bank’s IT operations, he overhauled the IT teams into a highly agile workforce and successfully led numerous IT implementations and migrations. Although you might have read about spear phishing campaigns convincing people to click on malicious links or attachments, this is no longer a necessity. Stay on high alert: encourage customer service teams to flag any messages that look suspicious. 7. Now that you know the basics, let’s put a whaling attack into context with some examples. Scammers are honing in on the shipping industry, using “whaling,” a.k.a. Here's how to recognize each type of phishing attack. Whaling is a specific form of phishing, where attackers target senior executives (“whales”) of a company rather than any user (“phish”). Whale phishing is a type of phishing attack that focuses on high-profile employee targets, such as the CEO or CFO. Is your business defending against this risk? Read our guide on email security for more information. While spear phishing yields small gains, whaling phishing attacks target big institutions for massive loots. When attackers go after a “big fish” like a CEO, it’s called whaling. Keep customer service teams alert Examples of whaling attack. It was the second time that malicious firmware was developed specifically for the purpose of destroying physical machinery – the first being Stuxnet, used by the U.S. and Israel to shut down Iranian nuclear centrifuges in 2009. Whaling is a specific kind of malicious hacking within the more general category of phishing, which involves hunting for data that can be used by the hacker. With over 165 million people heading to stores or shopping online during the frenzy that follows Thanksgiving, retailers will be busier and more distracted than ever. While you can't prevent yourself or your company's executives from being targeted in whaling attacks, there are steps you can take to reduce the likelihood these attacks will be successful.Â. The email uses the itservices.com customer mailing template. Many whaling attacks target CEOs, CFOs and other executives who have a high level of access to sensitive company information. A whaling attack is a type of phishing attack that targets high-level executives, such as the CEO or CFO, to steal sensitive information from a company. But all businesses have networks of suppliers and vendors, which dramatically increases the number of people attackers might choose to impersonate. With more emails being sent and received and with staff working at a fast pace for long hours, mistakes will inevitably happen. (Download Tessian’s guide to email impersonation to see this effect in action.) Emails from entities like the IRS (HMRC in the UK), or a communication from a court, have the potential to worry people and cause them to react instinctively, rather than rationally. We can help you continuously monitor your vendors' external security controls and provide an unbiased security rating.Â. The commercialization of online financial fraud has netted a $12 billion industry for phishing and whaling attacks over the last 5 years, largely … spear phishing attacks) Whaling emerges as major cybersecurity threat Fraudsters are using legitimate executive names and email addresses to dupe unsuspecting employees to wire … A whaling attack is a type of spear phishing that focuses on a high-ranking target within an organization rather than lower level employees. Whaling attacks are a very targeted type of phishing attack, and phishing attacks aren’t going away anytime soon – they’re far too effective. Typically used for malicious reasons. CxOs are incredibly busy and under a tremendous amount of pressure. A whaling attack is a type of spear-phishing attack directed at high-level executives where attackers masquerade as legitimate, known and trusted entities and encourage a victim to share highly sensitive information or to send a wire transfer to a fraudulent account. It is more effective to break down technical aspects into fundamental analogies as this helps them understand the IT perspective much better. These attackers often … In most phishing attacks, an attacker broadcasts an identical email to thousands of recipients. Working from home means that cybercrime is on the rise, and workers aren't as alert as they might be in the office - so we're here to explain how to spot them and what you can do about them. This is a complete guide to the best cybersecurity and information security websites and blogs. This is a complete guide to security ratings and common usecases. In this blog, we are going to discuss the Whaling attack that evolved in the last couple of years targeting someone like a top-level executive like a senior executive at a corporation. Whaling Attack Examples In 2016, an employee at Snapchat disclosed all of the company’s payroll data to a scammer – the employee had responded to an email that looked to be from the CEO and responded promptly. Many whaling attacks target CEOs, CFOs and other executives who have a high level of access to sensitive company information. An employee at a mid-sized business in Ohio received an email from her boss, the CFO, who was out of town. Vishing. To find out more about how to avoid seasonal scams, read our report. What is Business Email Compromise? In this blog, we are going to discuss the Whaling attack that evolved in the last couple of years targeting someone like a top-level executive like a senior executive at a corporation. The greatest challenge is hiring and attracting the best employees. One notable whaling attack occurred in 2016 when a high-ranking employee at Snapchat received an email from an … 3. The dangers of external impersonation are becoming better understood, but there is still a learning curve for security leaders within enterprises. Phishing comes in many forms, from spear phishing, whaling and business-email compromise to clone phishing, vishing and snowshoeing. The December 2015 Ukrainian power grid attack was a history-making event for a number of reasons. Keep calm and carry on Hackers will target these teams with phishing emails that contain malicious attachments or links, knowing that staff will need to deal with every customer enquiry they receive. Happy employees are much more likely to behave in a compliant and secure manner. Stay up to date with security research and global news about data breaches. Protect your customers by protecting your brand. Whaling is related to CEO fraud, with a key difference: instead of impersonating senior executives and targeting lower-ranking employees, attackers target the big fish themselves (hence the term). Defending Against Targeted Email Attacks, Austrian aircraft parts manufacturer FACC AG. The biggest social engineering attack of all … Tessian Defender detects all possible impersonation types, including the manipulation of internal and external contacts. A whaling attack is a type of spear phishing that focuses on a high-ranking target within an organization rather than lower level employees. Learn about the types of email attacks to protect your network from the most common cyber security threat. However, both attacks rely on cloning to convince victims of legitimacy. Here are our top tips for your business to survive the Black Friday weekend: Ultimately, if you are curious and flexible in your approach to solving a problem in IT then you have the right tools to get started. Not all whaling attacks end on a happy note like this story did. Do you have any advice for new CIOs to help set them up for success? They simply aren’t cut out to defend against increasingly sophisticated attackers deploying social engineering techniques and exploiting human frailties in order to trigger dangerous actions. The goals of a whaling attack are to trick an executive into revealing personal or corporate data, often through email or website spoofing. The employee was duped into giving the … Pierre-Yves has been the Chief Information Officer for Swedbank Luxembourg for over a decade. Phishing is the biggest risk for one in five IT decision makers at UK and US retailers during the holiday shopping season. Shoppers are expected to smash previous Black Friday spending records this weekend, with experts forecasting global sales of around $36.9 billion on Friday alone. If successful, criminals can use this sensitive information to steal from the company or impersonate the executive to scam other company employees. Learn where CISOs and senior management stay up to date. If just one employee falls for a scam, the retailer could face a security breach exposing the personal and financial data of thousands of consumers. They don’t understand that if you take good care of your employees, then they will take good care of the organization, especially in IT and cybersecurity. Snapchat reported the incident to the FBI and offered their employees two years of free identity theft insurance.Â, Another well-known whaling attack involved a Seagate executive who accidentally exposed the W-2 forms for all current and former employees. 4. A whaling attack is a type of spear phishing that focuses on a high-ranking target within an organization rather than lower level employees. Example 1 - Snapchat fell victim to a whaling attack. For the assessment of your information security controls, UpGuard BreachSight can monitor your organization for 70+ security controls providing a simple, easy-to-understand cyber security rating and automatically detect leaked credentials and data exposures in S3 buckets, Rsync servers, GitHub repos and more. Institutional impersonation Think before you click on email The employee was duped into giving the attacker confidential employee payroll information. Subsidiaries: Monitor your entire organization. What is Spear Phishing? Train temporary staff on the threat And legislation designed to make fines more than a slap on the wrist is now ramping up all over the world. Examples of Whaling Attacks. Read our guide on OPSEC for more information. All Rights Reserved. Nowadays it’s hard to think of data breaches and email attacks without the associated fines brought about by new regulation. After all, one employee misstep can have serious consequences for an organization. How to Protect Yourself From Whaling Secure Company Policies. However, this can only take you so far. Ideally, a whaling attack shouldn’t happen in the first place! Additionally, if the target organization does not have adequate email security, the attacker can employ email spoofing to make their emails appear to come from a trusted source within the organization, making it even harder to detect the attack. From the example of a whaling email below here is what you need to look out for: Is the domain name correct; Is the email out of the blue; Is there a sense of urgency; Tessian Defender’s stateful machine learning retroactively analyzes historical email data in order to understand the difference between safe and unsafe emails being received. Spear phishing is a social engineering attack in which a perpetrator, disguised as a trusted individual, tricks a target into clicking a link in a spoofed email, text message or instant message. Its CEO and CFO lost their positions as a result of the attack. Temporary seasonal workers play a critical role in helping retailers out during this busy time but they rarely benefit from the cybersecurity training that full-time employees receive. Another severe example is to install a backdoor to the server to eavesdrop on every conversation on the company’s network. These are the anti-phishing controls we suggest: Companies like Intercontinental Exchange, Taylor Fry, The New York Stock Exchange, IAG, First State Super, Akamai, Morningstar, and NASA use UpGuard's security ratings to protect their data, prevent data breaches and assess their security posture. Currently, for instance, Yahoo is tackling an enormous class action suit with estimated damages of more than $100m. “Zero-payload” attacks, a growing phenomenon, build trust with targets over time using entirely innocuous communications. They believed it would download a special browser add-on to view the entire subpoena. Whaling attacks, like spear phishing attacks, are more difficult to detect than typical phishing attacks as they are highly personalized and only sent to select targets in an organization.Â, While unsophisticated whale phishing relies solely on social engineering to trick targets, the majority of cybercriminals using whaling attacks tend to invest heavily in the attack to make it seem as legitimate as possible, due to potentially high returns.Â. Whaling attacks can be easy to pull off. Before joining Swedbank, Pierre-Yves worked in IT at both the Luxembourg Stock Exchange and IBM. Indeed, some threats are confined to IP addresses hidden in email headers – undetectable by employees. Achieve Next-generation Compliance by Reducing Email Risk. Whaling threats or CEO fraud continues to grow with 67 percent of firms seeing an increase in these email-based attacks designed to extort money. 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