Social Engineering And Its Top Cases

Social engineering has become one of the deadliest attacks of all time.  It has affected businesses in all sectors and has caused huge damage.  There are different types of attacks that come along the lines of social engineering, and a few of them are phishing, spamming, and more.  All these aspects are causing issues for businesses around the world.

This is why the demand for online cybersecurity experts is getting higher with every passing day.  It is important for businesses to have experts who can have a proper protocol in place with which the issues like social engineering attacks can be taken care of without any hassle.

As there have been several cases of social engineering, we are here to talk about the same.  This can help you understand the importance of cybersecurity experts who can help you keep the issues like social engineering away.

Let’s get going and check out the different social engineering cases that you must know about before moving ahead.

1.  Shark Tank

This is one of the latest social engineering attacks where the judge of Shark Tank television Barabara Corcoran was the victim.  She had to suffer the loss of approximately 400,000 USD because of social engineering and phishing.  Here the cybercriminal was acting as her assistant and sent an email to her.  The link was about accepting the request for payment renewal to some real estate requirements.  The entire mail was just like the legitimate one, and she fell for it.  Eventually, the fraud was successful, and she had to face a huge loss, as given above.

2.  Toyota

Another big case of social engineering was in association with Toyota Boshoku Corporation in the year of 2019.  Here the social engineering attack was on the respective auto supplier where the amount of money that was stolen sums to 37 million USD.  The attackers here were working as financial executives.  The bank account information was changed, and the victim didn’t know about the same.  So, the attack execution was perfect for the attackers as they were able to run away with a big sum of money.

3.  Cabarrus County

In the year 2018, Cabarrus County was another major victim of social engineering.  The loss they had to deal with was around 1.7 million USD.  Here the attackers first sent malicious emails to the suppliers of the respective organization, telling them to transfer the payments to a new bank account.  They were successful in their execution, and eventually, the loss was quite huge, as given above.  As per the latest reports, after the money was sent, it got diverted to several other accounts, and eventually, everything was unrecoverable.

4.  Ethereum Classic

Another big social engineering case that you need to know about has to be of Ethereum Classic in the year 2017.  In this attack, more than thousands of dollars were lost, and the victim of the same were several people who invested in this cryptocurrency.  The Ethereum Classic website was under the scanner here, and the hackers got hold of it.  This was because of the social engineering tactics where the hackers were acting as owners of the company to gain access to the domain.  Eventually, they did their execution wisely and ran away with the money that was from several investors around the world.

5.  Democratic Party

Dating back to the year 2016, Democratic Party also had to face the action of the effect of social engineering attacks.  The primary reason behind the respective attack has been spear phishing.  Because of this, they had to deal with the leakage of information and emails from the Democratic Party.  This might have been the reason for the results in the election that eventually made Donald Trump victorious over Hillary Clinton.  The hackers here made fake email accounts first.  They sent an email to every single user in the party to change the password, and this eventually let them have access to all the information.

6.  Ubiquiti Networks

In the year 2015, Ubiquiti Networks had to suffer a major loss of USD 40 million because of social engineering attack.  They are a manufacturer of networking technologies, and the attackers got hold of their data through phishing.  One of the employee accounts was the gateway of the attackers to execute all the malicious plans and eventually cost the respective business big time.

Ways To Prevent Social Engineering Attacks

Hopefully, you got an idea about the types of social engineering attacks that have happened over the years and cost businesses millions.  But, this doesn’t mean that there isn’t a way out of it.  If you are thinking about how you can prevent yourself and your business from this type of attack, then make sure to follow the below pointers strictly, no matter what the situation is.  Take a look.

1. The first and the most important aspect that you need to keep in mind is not to trust when it comes to your business data.  No matter how close they are to you, make sure that the authorization to your business data is fully under your control.

2. The second important aspect that you must follow is to ensure that the business emails are secure and safe.  You need to make the employees aware of the importance of never leaving their email accounts open while not being on the desk.  You need to make sure that they are regularly changing their passwords as well.  It is important for them to have passwords that are very challenging for them to crack.

3. Another important point that you need to keep in mind is making sure that spam emails are not open.  You need to delete all the attractive emails the quickest and not click on the same, no matter what.

4. Lastly, make sure to have anti-virus software installed on everyone’s system.  This can also help in the process of saving your business from falling into the trap of social engineering attackers.

Last Words

Hopefully, you got clarity about how businesses in different sectors have been the victim of social engineering.  It is important for all of us to keep our data safe and not trust anyone.  You need to follow every single protocol as given above to enhance the chances of not falling into the trap.  To know more, you can always knock on the doors of Securium Solutions and get complete support for the same.  Good luck!