As we approach the end of the year, LastPass Labs has reviewed the last 12 months to take account of the threat environment and how it has changed, as well as our accomplishments. Throughout 2023, the Threat Intelligence, Mitigation, and Escalations (TIME) team focused on rapidly expanding our capabilities to protect our customers from phishing sites and/or infostealers. A major part of this...

Is your 401k a target for cybercriminals? According to the latest article from U.S. News, warning signs such as missing contributions and unexplained transactions could indicate your retirement funds are at risk. Check out the article here to learn what signs could indicate that something is amiss, and best practices from Fortra’s security expert Eric George on how to protect your accounts.

In July 2021, the White House established a voluntary initiative for industrial control systems (ICS) to promote cooperation between the critical infrastructure community and the federal government. The fundamental purpose of the initiative was “to defend the nation’s critical infrastructure community by encouraging and facilitating the deployment of technologies and systems that provide threat...

One of our Digital Risk Protection service customers, LastPass, is committed to monitoring the cyber threat environment to keep our customers as secure as possible. To highlight this commitment, we want to call attention to recent joint efforts to disrupt a phishing campaign targeting LastPass customers and associates that began two weeks ago. We are sharing this with you not because it is a new...

Cybercriminals doubled down on popular threat types and preferred malicious software in Q2, with O365 phish and QBot malware dominating inboxes by significant margins. QBot operations eclipsed all other malware once again, reaching their highest volume of share just before a multinational takedown Tuesday removed malicious code from more than 700,000 computers. Similarly, but lacking in disruption...

Domain Impersonation: When Imitation Is Not the Sincerest Form of Flattery It’s no secret that an organization’s domain is a critical piece of the organization’s identity and business. People rarely need to manually enter a website address in their browser as search engines can give people a list of domains after entering just 2-3 letters. But how many people pay close attention to a domain...

In the ever-evolving landscape of cybercrime, look-alike domains remain a constant component in the vast majority of threats. Look-alike domains or, URLs that resemble those of a legitimate brand, can cause significant damage to brand reputation by way of fraudulent websites, phishing schemes, malware distribution, and more. Original research conducted by Fortra’s PhishLabs analyzes how look-alike...

As technology advances, the battle between cyber criminals and organizations intensifies. Cyber threats have become more sophisticated, complex, and widespread, posing a significant risk to the security and integrity of sensitive data. In Q1 2023 alone, the number of global cyber attacks increased by 7% , with an average of 1,248 attacks reported per week. In a separate report by The Independent...

In Q2, phishing attacks targeting social media platforms increased more than 23%, according to Fortra’s PhishLabs. This is the greatest volume of attacks on social media in two years and puts the industry ahead of historically top targeted financial institutions. Every quarter, Fortra’s PhishLabs examines hundreds of thousands of phishing attacks targeting enterprises and their brands. In this...

The latest Verizon Data Breach Investigations report indicates that over 70% of data breaches involved the human element. Cybercriminals exploit people to trick them into clicking unsafe links, opening malicious attachments, entering their credentials into bogus login pages, sharing sensitive data, and authorizing fraudulent fund transfers. One area where many exploits take place is on social...

QBot dominated as the top payload in Q2 with more than 95% of reported volume, according to Fortra’s PhishLabs. This is the third consecutive quarter QBot has led all other malware varieties by a significant majority. QBot was also consistently reported as a top payload in 2022, falling second only to Emotet and Redline Stealer before its current streak. Email payloads remain the primary delivery...

You did it! You can now take a quiz and accurately answer "What Is DMARC?"! Next you've generated your DMARC record, implemented your policy, and authenticated your email domains. DMARC is no easy feat in itself and now, after DNS requests, third-party conference calls and writing internal policies, you are ready...to enforce a stricter DMARC policy ! If your DMARC policy has been set to p=none...

Polymorphic and metamorphic malware constantly changes itself in order to avoid detection and persistently remain on the system. This adaptive behavior is the main distinctive attribute of these types of malware, which is also why they are harder to detect; it is also why they pose a great threat to systems. On the surface, the functionality of this sort of changing and mutating malware appears...

Threats in corporate inboxes hit new highs with a quarter of all reported emails classified as malicious or untrustworthy. 99% of these threats were email impersonation threats, such as BEC and credential theft lures, that lack attachments or URLs delivering malware payloads. Cybercriminals continue to bypass traditional email security tools and reach end users by impersonating individuals...

Free domain registrations used to stage phishing sites have experienced a significant drop in activity, contributing to just under 2% of phishing abuse in Q1. Free domain registrations and other no-cost means of staging phishing infrastructures are historically a favorite of threat actors. While no-cost methods as a whole did make up the majority of abuse in Q1, the decline in free domains can be...

Email impersonation is the fastest growing and most successful means of bypassing email security controls. In Q4 2022, the response-based and credential theft attacks that make up email impersonation reached their highest percentage of share of all email threat volume, contributing to more than 97% of attacks reported by end users. In this series, we look at the top email impersonation threats...

Business email compromise (BEC) is a dangerous type of email spoofing that targets businesses, aiming to damage them in some way. Overall, BEC “is one of the most financially damaging online crimes,” according to a joint Cybersecurity Advisory by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations (FDA OCI), and the US Department of...

The demand for Digital Risk Protection (DRP) is on the rise as cybercriminals are increasingly targeting businesses on channels outside the corporate firewall. According to Frost & Sullivan’s 2022 Frost Radar Global DRP Report , the traditional security perimeter has changed, and unlike phishing attacks that can be managed and mitigated through internal controls, these threats live on spaces not...

Phishing sites impersonating reputable organizations continue to represent the top online threat to businesses and their brands. In Q4, Financial Institutions were targeted most by credential theft phish, experiencing the largest share of malicious sites recorded since 2021, according to Fortra’s PhishLabs. Within the group, criminals capitalized on the broad customer bases and recognizable names...

One of the most popular attack strategies used by criminals to mislead consumers into doing the wrong thing is phishing. Phishing can occur via text message (SMS or instant messaging apps, coined SMiShing), social media or via phone, but email-based attacks are the ones most often linked to the term. It's easy for phishing emails to reach millions of users at once and to blend in with the many...