Receiving emails is a normal thing for someone to experience the course of their work day, but in spite of the fact that this is the case studies have shown that a sizeable chunk of the emails that people receive are rather unwanted because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up. Not only are these emails are nuisance, they can also make phishing attacks far more prevalent than might have been the case otherwise.
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that around 40% of all cyber attacks start off with a phishing attempt. Malicious URLs are also high up on this list, but they only represent about 12.5% of all cyber attacks that are being conducted these days. Hornet Security analyzed around 25 billion emails to come up with a new report, and this report details just how severe the problem has become.
Around 28% of all phishing attacks use archive files that are often compressed into ZIP files. 21% used HTML, 13% of the malicious files comprised of Microsoft Word documents, with 12% being PDFs. Microsoft Excel files were also used surprisingly often, comprising around 10% of all attacks with all things having been considered and taken into account.
According to this study, around 2% of the emails that were scanned turned out to be malicious in nature. That might not seem like a lot, but it actually comes up to 50 million malicious emails in total.
Consumers need to be educated about the dangers of such emails, otherwise they will continue to be susceptible to them. Phishing attacks are basically why we have always been told not to open emails unless we know who they are from, and it is quite surprising that they continue to be such a problem to this very day. Improved user education can show them how to spot a phishing attack and prevent it from allowing malicious actors to gain access to their systems and all of their valuable private data.
Read next: 6 In 10 Of Financial Apps On Google Play Store Are Exposed to Application Repackaging Attacks While Some Have Already Been Repacked
With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that around 40% of all cyber attacks start off with a phishing attempt. Malicious URLs are also high up on this list, but they only represent about 12.5% of all cyber attacks that are being conducted these days. Hornet Security analyzed around 25 billion emails to come up with a new report, and this report details just how severe the problem has become.
Around 28% of all phishing attacks use archive files that are often compressed into ZIP files. 21% used HTML, 13% of the malicious files comprised of Microsoft Word documents, with 12% being PDFs. Microsoft Excel files were also used surprisingly often, comprising around 10% of all attacks with all things having been considered and taken into account.
According to this study, around 2% of the emails that were scanned turned out to be malicious in nature. That might not seem like a lot, but it actually comes up to 50 million malicious emails in total.
Consumers need to be educated about the dangers of such emails, otherwise they will continue to be susceptible to them. Phishing attacks are basically why we have always been told not to open emails unless we know who they are from, and it is quite surprising that they continue to be such a problem to this very day. Improved user education can show them how to spot a phishing attack and prevent it from allowing malicious actors to gain access to their systems and all of their valuable private data.
Read next: 6 In 10 Of Financial Apps On Google Play Store Are Exposed to Application Repackaging Attacks While Some Have Already Been Repacked
