If you spend any amount of time on the internet, you have probably heard of phishing scams, and the disastrous results falling victim to them can have on your cybersecurity. These can have detrimental effects to businesses or even to individuals, and they can happen to anyone, so it is essential to remain vigilant and knowledgeable. WARNING! Recovering after a phishing scam or other security breach is difficult, and in some cases, impossible. Prevention is the best way to ensure that your personal and business information remain secure and invulnerable. Let’s take a look at what exactly phishing scams are, how to tell if you are being scammed, and how ANAX can help

What is Phishing? 

Phishing, in simplest terms, is an attempt to gain access to sensitive information by means of email or text message. This is a cybercrime, and is considered criminal activity punishable by law, as it poses great danger to personal or private data. Often, the attacker(s) pose as a well-known or legitimate corporation or company. They request information such as personal identification details, including social security numbers, banking or credit card information, usernames and passwords, and more. 

As a result of their masquerade as a credible business, and well-designed emails or texts as ploys, individuals or businesses may fall victim by offering up information before recognizing the illegitimacy of the operation. By then, it’s far too late to recover. As soon as these sensitive details are shared, they can be used to cause irreversible damage to a business, it’s security, and it’s finances. Let’s take a closer look at how far this destruction can reach. 

What are the Results? 

This category of cyber attack can have disastrous results for businesses. These results can include security breaches of sensitive customer or client information, causing distrust in the future even if security is re-established. It can lead to identity theft and the long-term effects of that. It can also lead to attackers accessing financial institutions and stealing funds from the business or clients. Even if all money is recovered, and your business ensures security of information in the future, it can be impossible to rebuild ruined client relationships. 

Characteristics of Phishing

Phishing is a tragedy that no business wants to fall victim to. Luckily, there are a few ways to verify the legitimacy of corporations when information is requested via email or text. Often, these requests come partnered with offers or statements that seem very, very good. Too good to be true, in fact, and that’s just what they are. Urgent action required is also a red flag for suspicious activity. Rushing your response is a tactic used by phishers to encourage you to act before you have a chance to think about it.

Another thing to watch out for is links within a sketchy email. In any circumstance, it is far safer to access the website directly as opposed to following links embedded into emails. If you are to click on a hyperlink, first ensure that the website is legitimate and secure. Verifying the sender’s email address can also prevent any information from being shared insecurely. Lastly, never download any attachments if you are unsure of the source of the email. Files can be disguised to look innocent enough, but may instead be ransomware or malware that gets installed on your computer as soon as you download. If you click an unsafe link or download an insecure file, and you do not have anti-malware present on your computer, the results could be disastrous. 

How ANAX Can Help

Spam Filters

Staying attentive to the emails that you and the rest of your business receive is essential to preventing a phishing scam’s success. There are additional security measures that can be taken as well, and ANAX is here to help. Spam filters are just one way of increasing your cyber security in the world of emails. This technology assists with analyzing the validity of the email sender, and filters questionable email to a spam or junk folder. It isn’t guaranteed to catch every phishing email, and some legitimate emails may get caught up in the spam net as well, but having these filters in place can be extremely beneficial. Knowing which filters to use and how to set them up properly can be time consuming, confusing, and overwhelming. That’s where ANAX comes in. 

Email Security and Training

Establishing cohesive email accounts on a server, creating new employee users and accounts, and setting limitations on storage capacity and what emails get filtered out are all services that ANAX can assist your business with. In addition, we offer one-on-one training solutions to ensure that all of your employees remain up-to-date and knowledgeable about the best ways to avoid falling victim to phishing scams. We develop a lasting partnership with your company to provide this training, monitor your company’s email habits and safety, and create and manage custom security solutions. 

Internal Testing

Our tech experts are experienced and equipped to help make your business as secure as possible. We can identify the best practices to protect your company against these scams, and we put that knowledge to work for the betterment of your business! We also have the unique capability to send out test phishing campaigns to your employee database to monitor who opens or clicks on emails, and to give an accurate assessment of how vulnerable your company data truly is. 

Additional Benefits

There are many benefits to bringing ANAX on board to prevent phishing scams. Not only will your sensitive information stay secure and private, you may even qualify for discounted insurance policies, and you can be better kept in alignment with regulatory organization requirements such as HIPAA, FINRA, and more. In order to prevent phishing scams taking a toll on your business, contact us today! 

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