Threat Hub
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Package notification lures deliver both malware and smishing. Cyber criminals steal unpublished manuscripts and ‘Bored Apes.’ And a look ahead at key themes for 2022.
This week on The Threat Hub: SMS phishing, or “smishing,” increased by more than 80% last year, while the spread of FluBot caused a similar spike in mobile malware. Uniting both of these attack types is a simple lure: package delivery notifications. Attackers have standardized around this theme, and there’s often little to distinguish between a malicious SMS linking to a phishing page or a malware download. Check out the blog for example messages and a breakdown of other smishing lure types. The post also contains suggestions for how consumers, businesses and mobile network operators can help stem the tide of mobile attacks.
And on this week’s Five-Minute Forecast we’re starting the year with a double dose of high culture: crypto-thieves steal NFTs worth over $2 million, and a former publishing employee spends years phishing for manuscripts by high-profile authors. Also on the podcast this week, Proofpoint Cybersecurity Evangelist Brian Reed looks back at the threat landscape of 2021 and ahead to the key themes of 2022.
As more organizations deploy email-reporting tools, researchers are getting a clearer picture of how effective people are at spotting true threats. Among users of our PhishAlarm Analyzer tool, average accuracy is just 31%, meaning a lot of messages are erroneously flagged as malicious or suspicious. Still, some organizations approached 100% accuracy.
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Learn MoreIn 2021 the spotlight of global attention fell on cyber criminals like never before. In our first semiannual threat update, we explore new techniques and old tricks in a rundown of the year's biggest themes and schemes.
Dive deep into how an extraordinary year has changed the threat landscape
—and what it means for the year ahead. Our premiere threat report draws from one of cybersecurity's largest and most diverse data sets to explore user vulnerability, attacks and privilege through a people-centric lens.
About The Threat Research Team
Our threat researchers are responsible for tracking shifts in the cybersecurity landscape, identifying new attacks as they emerge, and monitoring how threat actor tactics, techniques and procedures change over time. The threats they detect and the signatures they write feed into our platforms and are keystones in a system that analyzes more than 2.2 billion emails, 35 billion URLs and 200 million attachments every single day.
By studying what cyber criminals are doing now, our threat researchers are better able to anticipate what they’ll do next. Every day, their work keeps our customers protected—not just from today’s attacks, but tomorrow’s threats as they evolve.
