MOBILE PHISHING IS ON THE RISE AND TARGETING THE FINANCE SECTOR
CHEQUING OUT
There are some threats which never go out of style : Ransomware , DDoS and of course , phishing . In this article , Chris Steiner , VP EMEA , Zimperium , discusses the ever-growing threat of phishing , specifically for the finance sector .
Phishing is one of the most common forms of cybercrime and nearly 3.5 billion phishing emails are sent every day . Furthermore , they ’ re a key factor in many data breaches : According to Verizon ’ s Data Breach Investigations Report , 36 % of all data breaches involve phishing . This is even more pronounced when thinking about the business world with a Digital Guardian report finding that 90 % of corporate data breaches are the result of phishing . Furthermore , the 2022 FBI Internet Crime Report claimed that phishing had been the top internet crime for the past five years .
The rise of mobile phishing
However , as technology has changed , so has the manner in which attackers carry out phishing . In the last few years – the mobile endpoint has become THE business endpoint . In fact , the 2023 Global Mobile Threat Report ( GMTR ) shows that 60 % of endpoints that access enterprise data are mobile devices . One might argue that they ’ re actually the most significant endpoint currently operating in business .
Attackers will go where there is data to steal and weak points to exploit . As one might expect , attackers have followed suit . Mobile phishing grew precipitously in the last year . Zimperium researchers found in the 2023 GMTR that 80 % of phishing sites either specifically targeted mobile devices or were built to function on both mobile devices and traditional endpoints – 5 % higher than the previous year .
This can be read as a response to the success of email based phishing . In response , security professionals have devised defences and employed education against email-based phishing . In response , attackers have decided to change tactics – increasingly targeting mobile devices where they appear to enjoy more success .
Phishing in the financial sector
This trend towards mobile phishing is increasingly being deployed in the direction of the finance sector . This sector accounts for nearly a quarter of all mobile phishing attacks , 60 % more than mail www . intelligentfin . tech
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