Strategies for Handling Phishing Scams Once Detected
In today's digital age, cybersecurity incidents, particularly phishing, pose a significant threat to businesses of all sizes. The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has outlined a series of incident response steps to help organizations rapidly detect breaches, minimize damages, mitigate loopholes, and restore operations.
Phishing qualifies as a serious cybersecurity incident, with many of the most devastating cyberattacks involving phishing. In fact, an estimated 90% of incidents that end in a data breach start with phishing. This underscores the importance of having a robust phishing incident response plan in place.
This plan includes strategies and procedures to deal with a phishing attack, such as having appropriate tools and stipulated processes. The detection and analysis phase of the plan provides insights into the incident's scope, including affected networks, systems, applications, cause, origin, perpetrators, tools, and attack methods.
Containment is a crucial step to limit the damage of a cyberattack. Organizations should develop containment strategies for each incident type with clearly documented criteria. During this phase, malware is mitigated, breached user accounts are disabled, and all exploited vulnerabilities are identified and mitigated.
Recovery involves restoring normal operations, including actions such as restoring systems from backups, rebuilding systems, replacing affected files with clean versions, installing software patches, changing compromised passwords, and tightening the network perimeter security.
The cost of phishing-related security incidents is on an upward climb. The average cost of a ransomware-related data breach stands at $4.54 million. To combat this, tools like Graphus, an AI-powered, automated email security solution, can be invaluable. Graphus deploys seamlessly to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace via API, without big downloads or lengthy installs.
Graphus provides three layers of protection against phishing threats, spear-phishing, business email compromise, ransomware, and other threats. It is up to 40% more effective at spotting and stopping malicious messages than an SEG or conventional security. Moreover, it offers intuitive reporting to help organizations gain insights into the effectiveness of their security, level of risks, attack types, and more.
Preparation is key in incident response. This stage involves establishing and training the incident response team, acquiring all the necessary tools and resources, and performing risk assessments to identify existing threats and vulnerabilities.
It's essential to remember that one successful phishing attack can lead to more attacks, as cybercriminals intend to take maximum advantage of the loopholes in your systems and network. Therefore, a tested phishing incident response plan is critical to minimize the damage caused by a phishing incident and eliminate existing vulnerabilities in an organization's systems and networks.
Interested parties can start a conversation about Graphus today to learn more about its features and benefits. Post-incident activity involves learning and improving after each incident, with the organization producing a detailed report about the cause and cost of the incident and the steps to prevent future incidents.
As phishing attacks continue to increase, with more than 255 million reported in the first half of 2022, marking a 61% increase compared to 2021, it's clear that organizations must prioritize their cybersecurity. A well-structured phishing incident response plan is a crucial step towards ensuring the safety and security of your business.
