Cyber security expert: 90% of cyber attacks start with email

Cyber crime is no longer your mass email from Nigeria hoping that someone bites at the bait.

Paul Connelly, chief of security officer or HCA Healthcare told Rome civic leaders that the most typical cyber crime still originates with phishing emails that try to trick someone into clicking on a link that will launch something malicious.

“About 90% of cyber attacks start with email,” Connelly said.

Things to look for are something unexpected even if it comes from someone you think you know. Even it if’s something that seems convincing but generally is out of the ordinary which almost always attempt to direct you to a look or an attachment.

Connelly said that extortion attacks have become much more frequent over the last couple of years.

“Most notably it’s ransomware, a type of malicious computer software that goes in an encrypts your system. Whether it’s a laptop you’re using or a big system that a company is using. It will encrypt everything and basically renders it useless,” Connelly said. “Unless you’re willing to pay them they will not give you the key that allows you to decrypt.”

Experts now fear that the hackers are starting to shift into the realm of public safety. The attacks are staring to spread where hackers are targeting critical infrastructure — including healthcare facilities.

“The groups that are doing it have become much more sophisticated,” Connelly said.

In Oldsmar, Florida, hackers were able to change the configuration of chemicals in its water treatment facility.

“Fortunately an individual caught it before any contaminated water went out,” Connelly said.

In Germany, a person died after being diverted from one medical facility which had its system shut down. The nearest facility was another 20 miles away and she died in route.

“Police attributed it back to the ransomware attack. If she had been able to go directly to that hospital they think her life could have been spared,” Connelly said.

Best practices for fighting cyber crime include filters on email systems, filtering sites that people can visit on a computer and use of white hat hackers.

Connelly described them as a good guys with hacking skills who can come in and show a person or company where their system is most vulnerable.

More simply put, Connelly said, “don’t be somebody who clicks on every link.”