According to the latest reports, cybercriminals are increasingly targeting small businesses in the UK, USA, and India by trying to steal money from them by sending over infected mails to accountants and fund managers. These mails are socially engineered and consist of archive file attachments with .zip extensions. Reportedly, India has received 56% of these mails, US 23%, and UK 21%. Notably, these crooks are not targeting specific industries or companies but small businesses, in general – quickly turning from one company to the other, if they fail to secure a sign of compromise from a company.
Small businesses: What is the status of cybercrime?
It has been claimed that there is hardly any business that can completely ignore cybercrime. It has been estimated that cyberattacks cost the global economy around $445 million every year!
Cybercrime is rampant. And, the aforementioned news only goes on to substantiate this fact. One of the most potent ways to amp up your efforts to fight cybercrime is to educate yourself more about the nature of attacks. What are the things that small and medium-sized businesses must know about cyber attacks? We will find out here.
How do these cybercriminals attack finance companies or professionals?
The obvious way to befool finance directors or for that matter any other finance professional is to ask for urgent transfer of funds via fake e-mails. Now, the entire act of bluff is backed by a solid systematic approach. These crooks will ransack the company website and social media profiles to find out the e-mail ids and send you mails as is described above. The most common bait used to hasten the process is to mention that the need at hand is urgent and that it must be kept confidential. Owing to the ease offered by e-mail technology, it becomes very easy for attackers to spoof genuine e-mails.
The way to combat this evil? Do spread the word among your employees that you will NEVER ask for money via e-mails. Make them aware of the persistent problem (i.e. cybercrime) and place strict restraints over one-off payments as well.
Fighting cybercrime
One of the biggest deterrents on its way is ignorance. Many in the higher authorities are not aware of the scale of the problem. Even if they are, they don’t take proper measures against the same– simply thinking that they will somehow never be attacked. However, it is very important to understand that any company primarily based on the internet is vulnerable to cyber-attacks. It is not that reports of high-profile breaches are not published every day. However, some companies still believe that they don’t have valuable data which can be targeted by cyber attackers.
Please make sure you’re not undermining chances of you being targeted by cyber crooks as well. Take steps today! And, leave no stone unturned to emerge a victor in your struggle against one of the most needling challenges faced by finance companies today!
Hope this post will help. Good luck!
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