An internet security breach at your organization can cause you a lot of trouble. You’ve undoubtedly seen some of the staggering costs of cybercrime to U.S. companies.
In the last five years alone, internet crime has cost the U.S. $10.2 billion.1 And it’s not just larger organizations that are at risk. Studies show that 43% of cyber-attack targets are small businesses — and only 14% of those businesses have what it takes to defend themselves.2
Regardless of the size of your company, what some people consider to be a secure network just isn’t enough. Overlapping layers of security are a necessity because where one layer is bypassed another can block an attack. However, while you may be able to stop a hacker from getting into your system from an external source, cybercriminals can still hurt you by exploiting one specific vulnerability: your employees’ email.
According to the FBI, of the 467,361 internet crime complaints they received in 2019, phishing and related schemes were the most common.3 That’s because they are so effective.
Every single employee at your organization who has an email account can be a target of phishing scams. And these scams employ a wide variety of increasingly sophisticated techniques to fool your employees into divulging credentials and sensitive data, loading malware and ransomware onto your system or oftentimes, transferring funds into a fraudulent account.
Today’s phishing schemes use a variety of techniques, including spoof emails, brand forgery, CEO impersonation and other advanced methods of fraud that are difficult to detect. Even employees of Facebook and Google have fallen for these phishing attacks, with the two companies losing a combined $100 million during one long-running scheme.4
And the problem is only getting more severe during the current pandemic.
How COVID-19 Is Affecting Email Security
Most organizations have some or all of their employees working remotely, which has increased the need for email communications. Without the ability to gather in person for a meeting or stop by a co-worker’s desk to ask a question, more and more managers and employees are turning to email instead. The increase in email usage is necessary — but it’s increasing your vulnerability too.
With distractions at home and an excess of emails to get through, employees can let their guard down. To make matters worse, the procedural changes the pandemic has brought to vendors, banks, clients and your even your own organization have created an atmosphere of uncertainty that cybercriminals are exploiting. Already during the pandemic, the FBI has disrupted hundreds of COVID-19-related online scams5.
Clearly, it’s more important than ever that your online security strategy has the ability to stop the phishing threats your employees would miss on their own. Without good email security, you have little security at all.
How You Can Improve Your Email Security
Firewalls are an essential first line of defense for securing your network perimeter and doing some initial work to separate trusted networks from the untrusted. DNS filtering is another common layer in a company’s security stack which blocks access to certain websites, webpages, and IP addresses. And, for those who have the unfortunate experience of having these systems fail, endpoint security solutions detect and often remove malware that has been downloaded.
What’s missing? When considering security, there is one area that too many companies don’t focus on enough—email security. Firewalls, DNS filtering and endpoint security can’t protect you from email phishing schemes and standard email security, like the services provided by Microsoft through Office 365 simply doesn’t cut in anymore. Too many threats bypass Office 365 defenses and are delivered to inboxes.
Given that it takes just one employee falling for one phishing scam to cost your organization money and time, you need an email security solution that doesn’t just see what your employees can see, but can detect what they’re likely to miss. INKY see everything.
INKY is a cloud-based email security platform designed to see the way humans see and catch the millions of things they can’t see. Powered by computer vision, artificial intelligence and machine learning, INKY is relentlessly effective and catches pretty much everything from daily spam to the most sophisticated phishing scams and zero-day attacks.
INKY starts with artificial intelligence and then goes a lot further. The system recognizes brands just like you and your employees do but can spot imposters by a pixel. The more that INKY sees, the more the system learns; and the more the system learns, the more that INKY sees. This allows INKY to adapt in real-time to the evolving threat landscape and keep you protected 24/7/365.
But it’s not just about the way INKY learns. The system is set up to help your employees learn too. Typically, phishing-awareness training lacks real-world context, relying on hypotheticals. INKY, however, uses simple-to-understand banner alerts on every email that provide gentle — but persistent — cues whenever it detects something is amiss. This provides clear context and continually educates your employees, training them on what to look out for and easing the burden on your IT department.
The fact of the matter is, email was never designed to be secure. That makes your email system a vulnerability. But email is also an essential part of modern business operations — and that’s the dilemma of any internet security strategy. To avoid becoming the victim of cybercrime, you must secure your email.
See how INKY can help you do just that. Sign-up for your free demo today.
This blog was updated in April 2022.
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INKY® is the emerging hero in the war against phishing. An award-winning cloud-based email security solution, INKY® prevents the most complex phishing threats from disrupting or even immobilizing your company’s day-to-day business operations. Using computer vision, artificial intelligence, and machine learning, INKY® is the smartest investment you can make in the security of your organization. INKY® is a proud winner of the NYCx Cybersecurity Moonshot Challenge and finalist in the 2020 RSAC Innovation Sandbox Competition. Learn more about INKY® or request an online demonstration today.
1Source: https://pdf.ic3.gov/2019_IC3Report.pdf
3Source: https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2019-internet-crime-report-released-021120
4Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/27/phishing-email-scam-stole-100-million-from-facebook-and-google.html