Even the Luck of The Irish Can’t Keep You Phish Free

Maybe it’s the four-leaf clovers and the snappy green attire, but either way, we all feel a little bit luckier on St. Patrick’s Day. That is, of course, until something goes terribly wrong.

Holidays happen to be cybercrime favorites, as hackers and phishers try their luck at securing a pot or two of gold from some unsuspecting celebrants. Employers have good cause for concern as well, especially considering how much time employees spend using the company internet for personal purposes. One study showed that 50% of workers spend between 2-5 hours a week on non-work-related internet activities. Some even admit to spending up to 10 hours a week cyberloafing.¹ Without the right email security service in place, employers are left vulnerable to all sorts of cybersecurity threats including data breaches, credential harvesting, malware, ransomware, and more.

So, what should we be looking out for as we approach St. Patrick’s Day? Sadly, every year there tend to be new and mischievous antics at play.

Here are just a few of the typical holiday hacker hijinks you might encounter:

• Infected websites embedded into e-cards from a familiar sender
• Phishing emails offering malware-infected holiday screensavers and wallpaper
• Messages offering lyrics to Irish drinking songs that instead lead to treacherous websites
• Credential harvesting emails containing fake tickets sales to after-work celebrations
• Shareable holiday images embedded with malicious links

Given the fact that more than 75% of U.S. employees use their cell phones for work, there is still plenty to worry about when the workday is finished.² One study noted that 39% of surveyed organizations said they experienced a data security breach due to lost or stolen devices.² Just one green beer too many and an employee’s phone – along with all of their company email addresses and access to files – could fall into the wrong hands.

Feeling Lucky? (Don’t)

If you think the luck of the Irish will be with you this year, you’re not alone. 56% of small business owners believe their company is safe from cybercrime.³ But that’s a really big gamble to take regardless of company size. Especially since the FBI reported a jump of 1 million cybercrime complaints from May 2020 to May 2021 with losses totaling more than $4.2 billion.⁴

Do you know how most successful cyberattacks begin? If you guessed phishing attack, you’re correct. 38% of cyberattacks in the U.S. begin with phishing emails.⁵ From there, it just takes one click on one ill-intended message and your company could join the ranks of Colonial Pipeline, JBS Foods, Acer, and other recent victims of cybercrime.

Change Your Luck with INKY

While you can’t count on good luck to keep you safe from email phishing attacks, you can change your luck with INKY. An award-winning cloud-based email security software, INKY proactively and instantly scans inbound, internal, and outbound emails to eliminate phishing and malware. Driven by computer vision, machine learning, and artificial intelligence, INKY eliminates security threats by blocking malicious emails — many of which your secure email gateways (SEGs) and virus protection software programs can’t detect.