Surge in Covid-themed cyberattacks

Hackers taking advantage of people’s fears with scare tactics to steal sensitive info

WASHINGTON: It may look like an email from a supervisor with an attachment on the new “work from home policy.” But it could be a cleverly designed scheme to hack into your network.

The abrupt move of millions of people to working remotely has sparked an unprecedented volume of attacks to trick people into giving up credentials to attackers, according to security researchers.

“We’ve never seen anything like this,” said Sherrod DeGrippo, head of threat research for the security firm Proofpoint.

“We are seeing campaigns with message volumes up to hundreds of thousands which are leveraging this coronavirus.”

The pandemic has created a perfect storm for cyberattacks, with millions of people working in unfamiliar, less secure circumstances and eager for information about the virus and new organisational policies being implemented.

This opens up a new avenue for malicious actors using phishing emails or “social engineering” to gain access or steal sensitive information.

“When someone is working form their home it is a similar threat profile as at an airport or a Starbucks, you just don’t have that protection you might have in the workplace,”

DeGrippo said.

Tom Pendergast of the security and privacy training firm MediaPRO said many of the millions of people adjusting to the new landscape are unprepared for teleworking.

“It’s one thing if people have been working remotely with equipment that has been properly configured,” Pendergast said.

“It’s different for people who haven’t had that experience.”

Attackers are taking advantage of people’s fears about Covid-19 with scare tactics to get people to click on malicious links or attachments, but also playing on sympathies with fake crowdfunding pages purported to be for people who have fallen ill, he added.

Pendergast said healthcare organisations are especially susceptible to schemes such as ransomware because “they are less likely to shut down their systems by refusing to pay”.

This was highlighted with a major hospital in the Czech Republic hit with ransomware following an email campaign with a coronavirus “awareness” message, according to media reports. – AFP