{"id":5147,"date":"2022-03-08T10:53:08","date_gmt":"2022-03-08T15:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/?p=5147"},"modified":"2022-03-08T10:53:08","modified_gmt":"2022-03-08T15:53:08","slug":"what-is-phishing-a-simple-explanation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/2022\/03\/what-is-phishing-a-simple-explanation\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Phishing? (a simple explanation)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div style=\"height:30px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/What-is-phishing-ExchangeDefender.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5151\" width=\"761\" height=\"498\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/What-is-phishing-ExchangeDefender.png 650w, https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/What-is-phishing-ExchangeDefender-300x196.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 761px) 100vw, 761px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>According to recent reports from the FBI, Phishing has become the most common form of cyber attack in 2020 and 2021. <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.phishing.org\/what-is-phishing\">Phishing<\/a><\/strong> is a method that hackers use to steal your sensitive information like usernames or passwords. It is most often used for identity theft, where cybercriminals send a phishing campaign (via email) to gain access to your bank accounts, personal information, and more. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>The goal of a Phishing attack is to: gain <strong>credentials<\/strong> like bank pin numbers, usernames and passwords, gain <strong>personal data<\/strong> like your name, home address, and email, and also medical PHI information like treatment information and insurance claims. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Where does Phishing happen?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Approximately 96% of phishing\nattacks are delivered by email. In 2020, it was estimated that 1 in every 4,200\nemails was a phishing email according to a Symantec report. To put the numbers\nin perspective, for ever 1 second of internet activity, 3.4 million emails are\nsent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are also fake websites, social media accounts, and phone calls that are used by criminals to try to steal lucrative information. Beware of these websites, always check for the lock sign in your URL, and make sure that the spelling is correct. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What does Phishing look like?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Inside of a Phishing email you\u2019ll find a malicious link, that (when clicked) will transfer you to a fake website that will request your credentials in the form of \u201clogging in\u201d. Most phishing emails, when you look at the subject lines, you\u2019ll find that the following keywords are present, like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Urgent<\/li><li>Request<\/li><li>Important<\/li><li>Payment<\/li><li>Attention<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>The email would appear to be from a brand that you trust, like Amazon, Microsoft, or Facebook. The email \u201cfrom\u201d address is not actually from the brand, but rather faked to appear like it is. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What happens when a Phishing attack has been successful?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>2020 Phishing statistics show that about 90% of users cannot identify a sophisticated phishing email. It\u2019s not because we\u2019re dumb, its because the attacks are executed so well. It is becoming increasingly difficult for companies to secure their data because office workers are human, and humans make mistakes. After a successful phishing attack, about 60% of organizations lose their data, 50% are infected with ransomware and get their credentials or accounts stolen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:20px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Need Phishing protection for your business? Keep your company and data safe with <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/exchangedefender.com\/email-security\">ExchangeDefender PRO<\/a><\/strong>!<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Interested in learning more about Phishing protection, <a href=\"https:\/\/exchangedefender.com\/phishing\">click here<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,48],"tags":[52,136],"class_list":["post-5147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-security","tag-email-security","tag-phishing-protection"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5147"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5335,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5147\/revisions\/5335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.exchangedefender.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}