What are the ways to prevent phishing?

What is Phishing?

Phishing is a type of social engineering attack  that can be done via email. In this method, the hacker and the user are in contact, and the hacker tries to deceive the user using social engineering methods and then attacks the system and steals its data. One of the phishing features is that they have a surprise element, and an email is sent to the user exactly when the user does not expect it. Phishing and social engineering are usually done so that users receive some suspicious emails, and if they click on those emails received, they allow hackers to access their system. Therefore, it is recommended that you never click on and open suspicious emails, and you have not waited for those emails until your system is attacked.

According to statistics,  the number of phishing attacks  has increased significantly in recent years, with this occurring at about 32.35 times more than other cyber-attacks and about 241,342 phishing attacks.

In its, hackers communicate with users through text messages and try to persuade the user rather than click on the links they send. It is worth noting that users, by clicking on the links sent by hackers, allow hackers to access the system, and then hackers steal their data and information.

The process for phishing attacks is as follows:

1- First, the hacker accesses a reputable site and uses it to create a fake domain.

2- After that, it designs a message to persuade and influence the user. The message is designed so that the user is persuaded to click on the link sent by the hackers.

3- If users are persuaded and click on the link sent by hackers, it will ask users for a username and password. By entering a username and password on a fake page with a fake domain designed by hackers, users themselves provide their data to hackers. The function and purpose of  phishing attacks  are that hackers first design a fake page that looks like a reputable site and then persuade users to enter their important and personal information into that page. By entering important data such as usernames or passwords, hackers can easily access their data and steal their usernames and passwords to use.

Of course, it should be noted that technology has advanced a lot, and engines have become very smart, and Gmail has tried to quickly identify this type of piano. Every day more than thousands of messages of this type are deleted and considered spam. However, some hackers carry out these attacks in a way that is not detectable at all, and the user is deceived by them and enters important data such as username and password.

The most common reasons for phishing attacks are:

Designing professional and persuasive messages that can easily persuade users and create fake pages and  creating websites, and using reputable domains is not a complicated task. Therefore crooks use this method to steal data. And in addition, They can also easily convince users.

They are easily scalable and do not require much time at all, and in a very short time and easily able to achieve their goals, such as achieving important user information.

Are there any risks of phishing attacks?

Since phishing attacks are carried out in user-hacker communication, and the deceived user provides the user with important user information, he/she can have irreparable risks and damages. Imagine that hackers target an organization and a company and want to hack their system. In this case, by entering important user data and accounts in fake pages prepared by hackers, hackers can enter different types of accounts and steal information and data.

In addition, they can change the user data and change the password to cut off the account holder's access to his account. It is in this situation that in addition to losing the account, his data and all his information are also stolen.

The attacker may even misuse your accounts and try to do something illegal with your account, in which case you should be punished.

How can we deal with phishing attacks?

1- Implement stronger security measures:

By combining and implementing more security layers in enterprise applications such as Single Sign-on and Adaptive MFA, you can reduce the possibility of phishing attacks to some extent. Because if we use these security measures, the login step will be multi-step or so, and therefore hackers cannot easily log in to our system and account by entering the username and password.

2- Limit the level of attacks:

By automatically managing the life cycle of users, this  type of attacks  can be prevented to some extent.

If we use the identity management system, we will be able to define some permissions for each user so that they have access to some resources and can do some things. If we do this, hackers may not gain access to our accounts and systems by tricking users.

3- Increase the speed of action in the face of phishing attacks:

When we notice such attacks and think that our account is under attack, we must act quickly and take some necessary measures to prevent irreparable damage.

4- Lack of trust in anyone:

Spoofing is a type of attack  in which the attacker tries to make himself look like another person to attack the account holder at the right time and damage the system and its account. Spoofing is done in the form of extortion and intimidation. In this case, the attacker may use social engineering methods to persuade the account holder to allow him to enter the system. If this is done, the attacker encrypts all the user's data and files and then tells the user and the victim to give him the amount or something so that the attacker can also decrypt his data and files. This is to say that Spoofing is associated with extortion. The attacker may ask the victim for money or other things in exchange for encrypting the victim's data.

To protect your data, you should pay attention to the following points:

- You must check whether the website is valid or not

- If you do not know the website and the address that gave your email to Masha and you have not waited for the email from that website, it is better not to open it at all.

- Do not save login information to other systems

- Use strong passwords

- Use multi-step login so that hackers cannot easily enter your account by stealing your username and password

- Always click on the lock icon next to the site name and make sure you have an SSL certificate

- Delete suspicious emails without reading and opening them

- In addition to deleting emails, you can spam them if you see suspicious emails

- Never publish your important and personal information and data on the Internet

- Make sure the email address is correct and valid

- Update browsers

- Update the operating system

- Use security software designed and developed ( in German:  Sicherheitssoftware entworfen und entwickelt  )to protect the system and authentic antivirus

- Use a firewall

- Install special software designed and developed to combat phishing attacks

- Encrypt the data

- Track HTTPS protocol

- Use SNI filtering

- Use browser extensions

- Track the server's name

- Filter network traffic

- Before clicking on the links, be sure to think a little

- Beware of pop-ups