“Until we fully adapt to the new normal of working from home, hackers will use the pandemic to their advantage. To do this, they try to manipulate employees in such a way that they carry out safety-critical actions.” Some expert opinions from F-Secure.
Because of the pandemic, home office has become part of everyday life for many. In addition, large parts of the workforce are currently being increasingly encouraged to work from home if at all possible. However, the new situation poses a challenge for data security in companies and at the same time increases the risk of falling victim to phishing.
The new way of working and communicating suddenly forced companies to offer alternative communication channels, regardless of whether they were ready or not. Accordingly, we are already seeing an increase in ransomware attacks this year. After all, the new way of working increases the target area for many companies, not only on a technical level, but also on a social level.
Working from home can result in phishing
Hastily set up remote access for employees has given cyber criminals a playground to gain access to internal networks. In addition, the elimination of the familiar work structure also plays an important role.
Do you currently know all of your colleagues? If not, phishing or other cyberattacks are more likely to be a victim of phishing. Because if you used to get a call from someone posing as IT support, you knew it was a call from an unauthorized person. After all, tech support was a few desks away. So you could easily check that it wasn't him. Now without the personal interaction, do you know for sure whether a person is your new colleague or another phishing attempt?
The general uncertainty will grow in the future as the work processes continue to change rapidly. In other words, any change in the current status quo is an opportunity for hackers. Vic Harkness, Security Advisor, F-Secure Consulting.
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Weak points in IT security
In 2021 we still expect the pandemic to have an impact on our lives, our companies and our society. The consequences will change over the course of the year, especially with the availability of vaccines. Nonetheless, many companies seem to want to retain some of the home office processes that were introduced quickly in the first days of the pandemic. However, the introduction of new processes and technologies under these conditions is rarely good for data security. In any case, it is important to know that cyber criminals will continue to look for ways to exploit weaknesses in companies' IT security. Greetings from phishing and the distribution of harmful content. As a result, companies need to better protect their networks and everything cloud-based to keep their applications and data secure. Teemu Myllykangas, Director, B2B Product Management
Experts for more data security
During the pandemic and thanks to the lockdown with the home office, private and professional life are merging more and more. While email is still a preferred way of delivering malware, others are becoming increasingly popular. Because when private devices (phone, tablet, laptop) are also used for work, hackers suddenly have many more opportunities to cause damage.
However, in the future, I expect more CVEs (industry standards for security vulnerabilities) to be developed and thus more vulnerabilities to be discovered in software, especially for those that are frequently used by consumers (e.g. shopping app, for tracking deliveries). With this in mind, experts in the future will concentrate more on finding security risks in these apps / software and fixing them before they can be exploited by cyber criminals. Calvin Gan, Senior Manager, Tactical Defense Unit
More on this at F-Secure.com
Via F-Secure Nobody has a better insight into real cyberattacks than F-Secure. We bridge the gap between detection and response. To do this, we leverage the unmatched threat expertise of hundreds of the best technical advisors in our industry, data from millions of devices using our award-winning software, and ongoing innovations in artificial intelligence. Leading banks, airlines and corporations trust our commitment to fight the world's most dangerous cyber threats. Together with our network of top channel partners and over 200 service providers, it is our mission to provide all of our customers with tailored, enterprise-grade cybersecurity. F-Secure was founded in 1988 and is listed on NASDAQ OMX Helsinki Ltd.